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Court: British NHS Wrong in Cancer Case

Posted on: Wednesday, 12 April 2006, 21:00 CDT

By ROBERT BARR

LONDON - Britain's health service broke the law when it refused to pay for a woman's breast cancer treatment with a potentially life saving drug, an appeals court ruled Wednesday.

Herceptin is not licensed for treating early stage breast cancer in England and Wales and is only authorized for use on patients in advanced stages of cancer.

The case began when a local branch of the National Health Service denied Ann Marie Rogers, 54, the drug, saying her circumstances were not so exceptional she should be offered the drug in contravention of licensing rules.

Rogers challenged the decision, but a lower court found the Swindon Primary Care Trust acted appropriately.

But Wednesday, Britain's Court of Appeal ruled the Swindon Primary Care Trust acted unlawfully when it refused her request for the drug.

"I couldn't have asked for a better verdict, I did this for all women battling this dreadful disease," Rogers said, as she wept and hugged supporters.

Yogi Amin, one of Rogers' lawyers, said the judgment means hundreds of women in Britain may now be eligible for treatment with the drug, funded by their health authority.

Rogers' lawyers told the court that she considered the decision to deny her Herceptin to be a virtual "death sentence."

Some patients in Britain have paid for the drug themselves when denied the treatment by the health service, believing it offers them better prospects than conventional treatment.

Herceptin is thought to cut in half the chances of a recurrence of the HER-2 early form of breast cancer, Rogers' lawyers said.

Jan Stubbings, chief executive of the Swindon trust, said it had provided Herceptin for Rogers as her case went through the courts.

The Swindon trust had operated a policy of offering treatment with Herceptin in cases where a doctor considered there to be exceptional circumstances, she said.

Rogers' attorneys argued that it was wrong for the trust to discriminate between cases in such a way.

In his ruling, judge Sir Anthony Clarke - one of three judges who decided on the case - said the policy "in this particular case was irrational and therefore unlawful."

Lawyers for the health authority had argued that Britain's National Institute for Clinical Excellence - which regulates use of prescription drugs in Britain - has not yet determined if Herceptin was safe or effective.

Source: Associated Press/AP Online

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