One year on, no medicine has entered NHSE’s Innovative Medicines Fund

The NHS England Innovative Medicines Fund (IMF) should be efficiently utilised to expedite patient access to potentially valuable new medications, thereby
incentivising the pharmaceutical industry to develop costly drugs for rare diseases, according to medical experts. However, no medicines have entered the fund
since its establishment in 2021.

In their article for the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, health economics and policy specialists from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
(LSHTM) cautioned that mishandling the rollout of the NHSE’s IMF may deter vital evidence generation, concurrently shifting the financial onus from the
pharmaceutical industry to public finances.

Expanding upon the successful UK Cancer Drugs Fund (CDF), which provided early access to critical medications for over 80,000 patients, the IMF was established
with a parallel £340 million yearly budget. This fund aimed to simplify managed access agreements for treatments, including conditions like spinal muscular atrophy.