NHS England backs tighter control on Cancer Drug spending

Patient groups have reacted with alarm to plans to reassess the value to the NHS of many cancer drugs, which is likely to mean that some will be phased out because they do not offer value for money. A board meeting of NHS England has endorsed proposals that will impose much tighter control of spending on cancer drugs, requiring all those that have been paid for by the government’s £340m Cancer Drugs Fund to be re-evaluated by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice). Of the 47 drug treatments now available through the fund, Nice has already rejected 23 for general NHS use in the past because it found they were not sufficiently cost-effective.

The Rarer Cancers Foundation said the changes would set “cancer treatment back by a generation”. It claimed that nearly 22,000 people would be denied treatment per year. Proposals to reform the fund have been under discussion for some time, but NHS England has now officially adopted a plan that puts Nice at the center of decision-making. Breast Cancer Now is one of the patient groups that reacted with dismay.“These proposals do not offer sufficient reform on the existing Nice appraisal process. With the last six breast cancer drugs to be assessed by Nice being rejected, and with key issues left unaddressed, we’re concerned that clinically proven drugs will continue to struggle for approval on the new fund.”