Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans NHS England has to fund cancer molecular diagnostic tests centrally under the National Tariff Payment System in 2021-22.

The 2020/21 National Tariff:

“In addition, from 2020/21, all cancer genetic tests are now reimbursed outside of national prices. The existing funding arrangements will continue for diagnostic tests which have been excluded from tariff since 2015. These tests are: NRAS/KRAS testing, BRAF testing, KIT testing, ALK testing (1), ALK testing (2), Oncotype DX, PD-L1, Prosigna and EnoPredict.”

To support this £77.8 million was removed from the tariff. This is from the amount for National Prices and that was supplied to NHS England’s specialised commissioning.

These arrangements are proposed to continue and will be part of NHS England and NHS Improvement’s consultation on the contents of the 2021/22 National Tariff. The consultation is due imminently.