UK pays less for cancer drugs according to report

The UK paid the least per unit for new cancer drugs under patent according to research published in The Lancet Oncology journal

The research showed the UK, along with Greece, Spain and Portugal, paid the least per unit for new drugs under patent while Germany, Switzerland and Sweden paid the most.

Sabine Vogler, from the World Health Organisation's collaborating centre for pharmaceutical pricing and reimbursement policies (WHO PPRI) in Vienna, Austria, said: "Some high-income countries have managed to barter the manufacturers down to lower prices but these agreements, including the agreed prices, are confidential.

"Although these agreements ensure patient access to new drugs, other countries risk overpaying when setting drug prices through the common practice of external price referencing or international price comparison because they can only use the official undiscounted prices as a benchmark. There needs to be far more transparency.”

Researchers analysed the June 2013 prices of 31 drugs and compared them across 18 countries, also including Australia and New Zealand.

Total healthcare spending on cancer in the European Union was £37bn (€51bn) a third of which went on drugs, according to the report.

The researchers found that costs for the countries varied from between 28% and 388% of official prices, while seven of the drugs had a unit price of higher than £723 (€1,000), including one for lymphoma and myeloma patients that cost more than £3,612 (€5,000) per injection according to AOL.

In one example from the report taxpayers in Germany were paying 223% more for a drug to treat melanoma and leukaemia than those in Greece.

Vogler said: "We hope that our findings will provide concrete evidence for policymakers to take action to address high prices and ensure more transparency in cancer drug pricing so that costs and access to new drugs does no depend on where a patient lives."