How much is a life worth? Not much if the rules set by NICE (The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence) is anything to go by.
This is the body charged with deciding whether new drugs are cost-effective to the NHS.
Generally, Nice approves drugs that cost £20,000 for every extra year of improved quality of life they provide. It's known as a Quay or Quality Adjusted Life Y
ear.
I don't think this body is at all NICE. In fact, I think it's appalling, and I'm not alone.
It's dreadful that such decisions are being taken by economists and not doctors. Leading people in the medical world want this "barbaric and crazy" drugs watchdog to be abolished.
It's craziness which allows a postcode lottery to take place within the NHS – where a patient gets treatment in one area and not another.
It is sickening that people can sit in offices and decide to deny a person drugs which can prolong active life for months if not years.
There are cases of people being denied drugs and/or treatment which will preserve eyesight for years.
What a disgusting state we have come to when these sorts of things happen and yet the government is pouring out billions of pounds on benefits to many people who, if they had to, could stand on their own two feet.
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