UK government must re-assess patient access schemes before making NICE redundant, says think tank; ABPI adapts Code of Practice

The news that the UK drugs watchdog the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) will no longer deny patients access to new medicines is a welcome move away from centralized rationing, according to the Stockholm Network, a pro-market think tank.

Launching a new paper on patient access schemes, the system that looks set to replace the NICE (The Pharma Letter November 2), director Helen Disney commented: “Even at a time of austerity, the British public does not want or accept rationed health care. But it would be a shame if the NICE experiment was replaced by an equally unpredictable and misguided means of allocating resources”.

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has proposed using risk-sharing agreements between pharmaceutical companies and the National Health Service which offer “no win, no fee” mechanisms, as the basis for extending access to medicines. However, new research by the Stockholm Network - which examines 27 risk-sharing schemes already in operation in various countries - shows that they are still very much in their infancy and should not form the basis for more widespread use in the NHS.