Pancreatic Cancer

Guy Opperman Excerpts

Tuesday 4th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Eric Ollerenshaw]

rose—

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate and endorse what he says entirely. Does he agree that perhaps we should also consider going commando this Friday to raise male cancer awareness and show our general support for all cancers that people are struggling with today?

[Eric Ollerenshaw]

I am grateful for those well-timed interventions from my colleagues across the frontier.

What I am trying to get on the record is the fact that those two more months are critical in this particular cancer. Our worry is that two more months might not look good enough when the judgment is made, but for pancreatic cancer it is a massive improvement.

I also want to put on the record two other emerging possibilities. A useful and emerging new technology is NanoKnife. It carries out a process called irreversible electroporation, which destroys parts of the tumour while avoiding damage to vital tissue nearby, such as blood vessels. The process shrinks the tumour to a more manageable size, which might then allow more permanent surgical solutions. NanoKnife is currently available only through the private sector at one hospital in London.

A company called Novartis, has a treatment for neuroendocrine pancreatic cancer that is currently funded via the CDF in England. Although it is welcome that patients can access treatment via that route, we continue to argue for a long-term solution. In that context, we are worried about Andrew Dillon’s statement that, under the new system of value assessments that NICE is due to introduce in the autumn, only six out of 20 treatments assessed by NICE in the past year would be approved. A 30% approval rate is clearly not the long-term solution expected from the original concept of value-based pricing. In 2013, I understand, not one new cancer drug was approved by NICE. That issue, perhaps, is for a wider debate, but I hope the Minister understands that those arguing on behalf of pancreatic cancer patients are extremely worried about ever getting the new drugs on to the system and available for wider use across, hopefully, the whole United Kingdom.

Minister, this debate has been an unashamed appeal for support—from the charities concerned, the all-party group, the survivors and all those who have been affected by pancreatic cancer through the loved ones they have lost. We do not want others to go through our tragic experiences.