Is NICE Ageist?

12.15.07pm GMT Fri 17th Nov 2006

Speaking from her local rally in Southampton on the NICE decision, Sandra Gidley MP said: "The Liberal Democrats generally support the role of NICE in making decisions about which drugs and treatments are clinically effective and which are cost effective. However we believe that these decisions should be made swiftly, consistently, openly, and based on the best possible medical evidence."

Sandra said: "In this case NICE are refusing to disclose a fully-working version of the cost effectiveness model meaning the decision is not open to individual evaluation, leaving no-one satisfied that the decision took into account all the right factors."

In the court action the drug companies would also like NICE to develop new guidance using both a more accurate cost effectiveness model and data. "We support this move, as, by law, NICE is only allowed to consider the costs and benefits of a treatment to the NHS and statutory social services, as well as the impact on an individual patient and his or her quality of life. If a treatment provides wider social benefits - for example to carers - this is excluded from the evaluation process. I believe that this is wrong and that the rules should be changed so that NICE looks at a wide range of costs and benefits to society of drugs and procedures."

In England and Wales, where the ruling applies, 290,000 people have Alzheimer's disease, with numbers set to rise as the population ages.