Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how long her Department has been aware of issues associated with health technology appraisal of combination medicines for blood cancers; and whether her Department is giving additional resources to (a) NICE and (b) NHS England to tackle those issues.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) published a statement in November 2023 that clarifies the circumstances under which it will not prioritise enforcement action against drug firms when they implement a specific negotiation framework, to make more combination therapies available on the National Health Service. The statement is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/combination-therapies-prioritisation-statement

In the 2024 Voluntary Scheme for Branded Medicines Pricing, Access and Growth, NHS England committed to launching a consultation on updating the NHS England Commercial Framework for New Medicines, by July of this year. This consultation will reflect the CMA’s statement, and will be used to consider options for transacting a solution for some combination therapies, under specific circumstances.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) also gave specific consideration to the evaluation of combination therapies in the comprehensive review of its methods and processes for health technology evaluation, that concluded in January 2022. The NICE’s published health technology evaluation manual describes the considerations that will be given to the evaluation of combination therapies where relevant.