Allocation of resources

R (on the application of Cotter) v National Institute For Health and Care Excellence (“NICE”) and Secretary of State for Health and Social Care [2020] EWCA Civ 1037

A number of organisations are required to make difficult decisions about the allocation of resources in the healthcare context. The Court of Appeal has recently held that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) had not been in error in deciding not to use its Highly Specialised Technology (HST) procedure to appraise a new drug for treating the rare metabolic condition phenylketonuria (PKU). The drug did not meet all the criteria set out in the relevant NICE guidance for appraisal through the HST procedure. However, the court did comment that simpler language should ideally be used to describe the two systems of appraisal so that the criteria could be more easily understood by lay people.