August 10, 2007

scientists react to High Court ruling on Alzheimer’s treatments

The Science Media Centre asked scientists to comment on the court ruling which upheld NICE’s decision to restrict Alzheimer’s drug access to the neediest patients only.

Richard Gray, University of Birmingham, said:

“There has been a huge escalation in the costs of drug treatments and no health system in the world can afford to pay for every new drug that comes along. NICE is an efficient mechanism to make hard decisions on which drugs should be used for the benefit of society and which should not. It is essential that such decisions are based on the best scientific evidence and not influenced by the industry’s PR machine or by their heavyweight lawyers. The benefits from these drugs for Alzheimer’s disease are so small that the only way you can tell if a patient is taking the drug or taking a dummy tablet is if they get side-effects such as nausea or diarrhoea. These drugs are simply not a good use of the NHS’s limited budget and the court made the right decision.”