Roche’s Avastin to receive NHS funding for breast cancer

Roche's Avastin is to be made available to NHS breast cancer patients in London following a new decision to provide funding for the drug.

The Strategic Health Authority in London has agreed to pay for Avastin treatment among women with triple-negative breast cancer, as well as those who have received taxane when their disease was still at an early stage.

It follows a review of the clinical data and recommendations by the London New Cancer Drugs Group, which highlighted the progression-free survival benefits of the treatment.

Currently, very few therapy options are available to patients in this group, which often includes younger women and those from poorer socio-economic backgrounds and certain ethnic demographics.

Paul Ellis, professor of cancer medicine at King's College London, said: "It gives patients and clinicians further choice in a disease where there is a particular need for more treatment options."

This comes after the company launched a new personalised skin cancer therapy Zelboraf in the UK last month.