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The immediate reversion to discussion about the CDF rather proves my point! High profile and contentious policies have hidden the true picture.

It is of course worth noting that drugs (and their delivery) account for a relatively small proportion (about 22%) of overall spend on cancer services, with the rest being spend on interventions such as screening, diagnosis, surgery, radiotherapy and inpatient care.

When it comes to cost-per-QALYs, the simple truth is that we don't know what the cost-per-QALY is of most interventions (in cancer or other parts of healthcare). NICE's very important analysis has been mainly focused on drugs and a few other treatments. So we cannot compare like with like.