BRIEF—NHS to start paying for Kevzara

In the next three months, the National Health Service (NHS) will start providing Sanofi’s Kevzara (sarilumab) for routine use in combination with methotrexate (MTX) for English patients with severe, active rheumatoid arthritis who have responded inadequately to intensive therapy with conventional or other disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs and who cannot have rituximab.

The NHS is obliged to fund the treatment after the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) issued a positive final guidance for Kevzara in this indication.

This guidance also recommends the drug as a monotherapy for patients who are intolerant to MTX and cannot have rituximab.

The final guidance is in line with the final appraisal determination published by NICE in September this year.