When the government created the Cancer Drugs Fund (CDF) in 2010 to pay for cancer drugs rejected by the National Institute for Care and Health Excellence (NICE), it was intended as a short-term stopgap until a longer-term solution to the problem of evaluating and funding cancer drugs for terminally ill patients could be developed.

The fund, which was given £200m a year to spend on drugs, was set up in a context of media stories about cancer patients being denied life-extending drugs. Since then, 60,000 patients have received drug treatments funded by the CDF. Although initially welcomed by cancer charities, many feel it has outstayed its welcome.

Owen Sharp, chief executive of Prostate Cancer UK, says it creates an additional layer of bureaucracy, with the result that patients in some parts of the country are less likely to receive drugs from the fund than others, adding: “The fund was set up as a short- to medium-term fix, and I think it has proved to be exactly that.”

For more details, go to: http://www.theguardian.com/healthcare-network/2015/feb/27/cancer-drugs-fund-future