Lord Freyberg – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Freyberg on 2016-01-21.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what are the costs, rather than the tariff, of a cancer molecular profile using (1) a whole tumour-normal pair using Illumina technology at 70× tumour coverage, and (2) a deep sequenced next-generation sequencing panel test, as deployed in most major NHS teaching hospitals; and if those figures are not available, why not.

Lord Prior of Brampton

This information is not held centrally by NHS England. Where the cost of these tests falls outside of tariff, costs will vary according to commissioning arrangements, the systems in place and the technology used.

Further information on the costs to the National Health Service of whole genome sequencing in cancer and rare diseases will be derived through the 100,000 Genomes Project. The intended NHS re-procurement of Regional Genetic Laboratories will aid in defining the costs of genomic tests.