PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Cancer Drugs Fund (11 September 2015)

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the decision by NHS England announced on 4 September 2015 to remove (a) the pancreatic cancer drug Abraxane and (b) 22 other drugs and indications from the Cancer Drugs Fund list of approved drugs.

Asked by:
Sir Nicholas Dakin (Labour)

No such assessment has been made. We remain committed to continuing to invest in the Cancer Drugs Fund which has so far benefitted over 72,000 people with cancer in England.

We understand that NHS England continues to work with manufacturers seeking to maintain drug and indication combinations within the Fund.

NHS England has confirmed that patients who are already receiving a drug/indication which is to be removed from the Fund will continue to be treated with that drug until they and their clinicians consider it appropriate to discontinue treatment. In addition, drugs removed from the Fund will continue to be available via Individual Funding Requests if the individual patient meets clinical exceptionality criteria.

Answered by:
George Freeman (Conservative)
16 September 2015