Drug companies told to do a discount for expensive drugs on the NHS - The Times 2nd September 2008

Expensive drugs should be offered to the NHS free or at discount prices so that patients can be given access to them more quickly, the Government has said. Ministers are in talks with the drugs industry on how to speed up the approval process for new treatments, The Times has learnt. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), which assesses the cost-effectiveness of drugs in England and Wales, can take up to two years to approve a treatment for the NHS but the Department of Health wants to shorten this to six months, and it suggests that the drugs industry will have to make price concessions.

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