CEO Update | 21 June 2021

BIA Garden Party postponed

Following the Prime Minister’s announcement last Monday that COVID-19 restrictions were to be extended by a further four weeks in England, we have taken the difficult decision to postpone the BIA’s Garden Party. We hope to hold the event in person in September and we will share details once the new arrangements with the venue have been confirmed.

Public attitudes to Rare Diseases: The case for equal access 

Last week, the BIA launched a new report, Public attitudes to Rare Diseases: The case for equal access, which presents the findings of a YouGov survey commissioned by the BIA on public attitudes towards rare diseases and access to medicine.

The survey revealed that the public feel strongly that patients living with a rare disease should have equal access to medicine and that they would support measures to ensure this. When surveyed, 79% of respondents agreed that patients living with a rare disease should be able to access medicines through the NHS on the same basis as people living with more common conditions. Further, 78% of respondents agreed that the NHS should ensure access based on clinical need, even if this would be more costly.

These findings challenge assertions made by NICE that there is not the appetite or interest among the public for specific measures to tackle rarity as an issue. The report recommends that NICE revises its position on this issue and considers the value of a rarity modifier as part of the Health Technology Assessment (HTA) process to people with rare diseases and the wider public.  

NICE interim statement

Last week NICE published an interim statement, which sets out the procedures that will be used by NICE when considering requests from companies on commercial and managed access arrangements. This is intended to align NICE’s processes with the NHS Commercial Framework for New Medicines published by NHS England earlier this year and to clarify NICE’s role in the process. Key to the process is early engagement with NICE on commercial and managed access arrangements, which will help ensure that the right evidence is available at the right time to support a positive decision.

PM pledge to make UK a ‘science superpower’

The Prime Minister has written in the Daily Telegraph today laying out his vision for making the UK a science superpower. He will chair a new National Science and Technology Council, with Sir Patrick Vallance taking on a new position as national technology advisor to the Prime Minister, Sir Patrick’s heritage in life science is particularly positive for our sector. As details emerge of how this will work, we will share with members but its striking to see just how personally interested Boris Johnson is in granular investment in life science capability.

The article is worth a read. I was struck that he writes both that: “It is a wretched fact that British firms are currently investing a fraction of the OECD average on research; and though the speed of the discovery of Oxford/AstraZeneca was little short of miraculous, it was also something of a miracle that it took place here at all. Before Covid, the UK domestic vaccine industry had almost perished out of benign neglect. Had a couple of investment decisions gone the other way, this country might not have possessed the skills or practical capability to make vast batches of the vaccine that has been so indispensable to our success.” And: “we are investing unprecedented sums, increasing Government spending to £22 billion for scientific research of all kinds; and we need to use those billions of state spending to leverage in the many more billions of the markets. One way to encourage those private sector investments is to give the market players the confidence that they are backing national priorities – so that public and private sector come together to deliver the breakthroughs, like the Covid vaccine, that can transform our lives and economic prospects.”

MMIP

The Medicine Manufacturing Innovation Partnership (MMIP)’s summer conference was held last week, where we heard from a number of companies and stakeholders who were discussing the excellent work done to manufacture COVID-19 vaccines and the opportunities from this to grow this vital part of the ecosystem. This was summed up by the conference keynote speaker Nadhim Zahawi MP, Minister for COVID-19 Vaccine Deployment, who paid tribute to companies across the UK and highlighted the Government’s impending publication of a life sciences sector vision to further support our innovative sector.

COVID-19 vaccines

Positive news following on from the G7 that a UK Animal Vaccine Manufacturing and Innovation Centre will be established at The Pirbright Institute campus in Surrey, with the aim of stopping new animal-borne diseases before they put people at risk. More details of the new £40m centre can be found here.   

Great to see BIA member Vaccitech, which owns the technology platform behind the Oxford University/AstraZeneca vaccine, give such a positive interview to the Financial Times today on how adenovirus vectors could potentially be used to treat lung and prostate cancers. The company will enter clinical trials later this year and the article also touches on how companies using mRNA platforms are also hoping for positive results in their clinical trials. An exciting area to watch over the coming years.