Discounts Sway NICE As Novartis Outlines Concerns Over New Cancer Drugs Fund

NICE – the HTA body for England and Wales – has recommended that Novartis's Zykadia (ceritinib) be available on the NHS, but only at a discount. Novartis tells Scrip that with the imminent arrival of the UK's new Cancer Drugs Fund (CDF), there are concerns that access to new cancer drugs will become even more difficult.

NICE said it recommended Novartis's Zykadia to treat adult patients with anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK)-positive advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) previously treated with Pfizer's Xalkori (crizotinib). This follows a conditional approval of the drug last year by the EMA.

The drug was not recommended in earlier draft guidance due to "some uncertainties in the extent of treatment benefit," said...

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