Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to (a) utilise the complex patient access scheme to make Ruxolitinib available on the NHS and (b) consider other options for vitiligo patients to receive that medication.

It is for the marketing authorisation holder to propose a complex patient access scheme for a medicine being evaluated by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), which would then be considered by the NICE and NHS England through the established process. The marketing authorisation holder has proposed a commercial agreement for ruxolitinib but the NICE was unable to recommend it as a clinically and cost effective use of National Health Service resources at the price proposed in its final draft guidance, published in July 2024. A number of organisations appealed against the draft guidance. The NICE has not yet published final guidance, and its Appraisal Committee will consider the upheld appeal points at a future meeting, scheduled for 14 May 2025. The NICE is open to working with NHS England to ensure that commercial arrangements that are operationally manageable for the NHS can be taken into account.

Where the NICE does not recommend a treatment as a clinically and cost-effective use of NHS resources, it will not usually be routinely funded by the NHS. NHS commissioners are, however, required to consider exceptional funding requests for individual patients.