Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the effect on (a) patients and (b) public health of reducing the cost per QALY threshold in England to £15,000 for medicines and vaccines; and if he will make a statement.

For vaccines, the Department is currently consulting on the Cost Effectiveness Methodology for Immunisation Programmes and Procurement (CEMIPP) report which was produced by the independent CEMIPP group. This is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/cost-effectiveness-methodology-for-vaccination-programmes

The CEMIPP group was set up to look at the methodology for determining the cost-effectiveness of new and existing immunisation programmes and to make recommendations on if and how methodology could be improved. This report included a recommendation that the cost per quality-adjusted life year threshold for vaccines should change from £20,000 to £15,000.

An assessment of what impact this, and a number of other recommendations in the CEMIPP report, might have on the cost effectiveness of existing vaccination programmes has been produced. This is based on commercially confidential information.

In addition, the Department has considered the impact of changing the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence thresholds for medicines on patients. This is also based on commercially sensitive information.