NICE makes an exception

Draft supplementary advice released this month by the U.K.'s National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence would allow appraisal committees to recommend NHS coverage of drugs for terminally ill patients even if the treatments normally would be considered too expensive - provided the drug meets patient population and efficacy criteria.

The new criteria won't make a difference for drugs NICE already has rejected. But the benchmarks could provide a new lease on life for four drugs to treat renal cell carcinoma (RCC) and one to treat multiple myeloma (MM) that have received negative preliminary recommendations...