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 effectiveness of the NICE process on the wider societal cost of dementia when appraising new dementia treatments.

The National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE) develops its guidance independently and based on an assessment of the available evidence. In developing its recommendations, NICE considers all health-related costs and benefits for patients and caregivers, in line with its established methods and processes. NICE does not consider wider societal costs and benefits.

Any changes to NICE methods to broaden its cost-benefit analysis and incorporate wider societal costs would be both methodologically and ethically challenging. Such changes could have unintended consequences, potentially leading to fewer treatments being recommended for populations that are older, economically inactive, or have greater care needs.