NHS England to Cover AstraZeneca's Enhertu for 1,000 Patients — SkimNews
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- NHS England agreed to cover AstraZeneca's Enhertu, extending the antibody-drug conjugate to an estimated 1,000 people with metastatic breast cancer whose tumors have low levels of HER2 — patients previously ineligible in England.
- AstraZeneca had faced a years-long dispute over the drug's non-coverage in England, which had stoked questions about the company's commitment to the U.K. market.
- The coverage decision stems in part from a U.S.-U.K. drug pricing deal reached late last year, under which a U.K. health agency raised the cost-effectiveness thresholds the NHS uses to decide which drugs to pay for.
- Scotland has already covered Enhertu since 2023, and the drug is reimbursed in 26 other European countries, underscoring England's lag before this decision.
- Enhertu is a next-generation chemotherapy known as an antibody-drug conjugate, a class designed to deliver cytotoxic agents directly to cancer cells.
Why it matters: Roughly 1,000 English patients with low-HER2 metastatic breast cancer gain access to Enhertu — a drug already reimbursed in Scotland since 2023 and 26 other European countries — because the late-2024 U.S.-U.K. drug pricing deal raised the NHS's cost-effectiveness threshold, effectively making a previously rejected drug newly affordable under the same pricing terms.
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