The government’s drug advisory body, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice), has issued a provision ruling that it will not be recommending a new drug for arthritis on the NHS – despite the fact that patients in Scotland will be able to receive it.

The Daily Telegraph reports that Tocilizumab – also known as Roactemra – is used to treat advanced symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis and would cost the health service £9,000 a year for each patient treated. However, Nice has said that it would not be a cost effective treatment for the NHS. The Scottish Medicines Consortium north of the Border has, however, recommended it for use in NHS Scotland.

Roactemra has been described as a ‘life saving’ drug because it can be prescribed for patients whose usual medication has stopped being effective. Many rheumatoid arthritis patients reach this stage in their treatment and are left in pain and facing disability from the crippling condition. Arthritis support groups have labelled Nice’s provisional decision ‘cruel’

Chief executive of the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, Ailsa Bosworth said:

‘People are virtually suicidal because they have nowhere else to go – and yet they know that there are other drugs out there that they could have access to, but cannot because of Nice.’

Ms Bosworth added that it was ‘ludicrous’ that over the Border, just two miles away from England, other rheumatoid arthritis patients could be prescribed the drug under the NHS.

Other EU countries – including France and Germany – also prescribe the drug.

In England, patients in the advanced stage of the disease are currently prescribed methotrexate or a class of drugs known as anti-TNFs with methotrexate.

Studies have shown that Roactemra can improve advanced symptoms six-fold, compared with methotrexate, however. Around 37,000 patients in England could benefit from the drug.

Chief executive of Arthritis Care and vice president of the European League against Rheumatism, Neil Betteridge, said:

There are people who are most severely affected by this debilitating condition – living in intense pain, unable to work, often struggling even to walk – who have been failed by existing treatments, and it's for them that tocilizumab [Roactemra] could provide real hope.’

A final Nice appraisal regarding the drug is expected later in the year. In December, Nice challenged its maker, Roche, to provide more evidence of the drug’s cost effectiveness.

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