England’s Single National Formulary: Win-Win Reform or New Market Access Bottleneck?
The NHS in England is moving towards a Single National Formulary (SNF) for medicines. In the government’s Fit for the Future: 10 Year Health Plan for England, published last July, the commitment is clear: “ We will therefore move to a Single National Formulary (SNF) for medicines within the next 2 years. We will create a new formulary oversight board, responsible for sequencing products included in the formulary based on clinical and cost effectiveness, supported by NICE. Local prescribers (such as clinicians and pharmacists) will be encouraged to use products ranked highly in the SNF but will retain clinical autonomy as long as they prescribe in line with NICE guidance. The intention of this policy is to ensure that we can drive rapid and equitable adoption of the most clinically and cost-effective innovations . ” [1] The policy sits alongside wider plans to streamline procurement, improve adoption of innovation, reduce variation in access across the NHS as laid out in the UK Gov...
