'I've spent nearly £30k on a miracle cancer treatment that the NHS won't fund'

When the effects of the drug Enhertu were first revealed, people cheered. It is now available across the world, so why are patients in England being denied it? Leah Hardy reports

- Leah Hardy

In April, Christina Black heard the words every cancer patient dreads: “We’ve run out of treatments. There is nothing else we can give you.” A doctor had just explained that Christina’s latest scan had revealed that tumours which had spread from her breast to her liver, lungs and spine had grown. This meant her treatment was no longer working, and there were no more options left.

Christina, 63, says: “It was devastating. I was clinging to my husband Paul and crying. I remember saying, ‘What do I do now?’ I had to discuss my end-of-life wishes and was put in touch with the palliative care team at the hospital.”

Yet months on Christine is not just alive and well, but her previously unstoppable tumours are shrinking. Why? Because she is taking a remarkable life-extending breast cancer drug called Enhertu. The downside? The NHS refuses to fund it. That means Christina and Paul, 64, from Liverpool, are being forced to spend their pensions and life savings to pay for the £87,000a-year drug.

“It’s a horrible situation,” says Christina, her voice cracking with emotion. “Enhertu is the difference between life and death for me. But we don’t know how long we can continue to pay for the treatment.”

Christina was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 1997 at the age of 36. “It was an emotional time,” she recalls. “I was a single mum at the time, and I had to stay strong for my son, Marc, who was 14.”

In spite of surgery and radiotherapy, Christina’s cancer recurred in 2005, with tumours now growing in her collarbone and neck. Over the next two decades, despite 87 rounds of chemotherapy, more than half a dozen different drugs and a mastectomy in 2016, the disease spread throughout her body. As well as the internal tumours that left her out of breath and exhausted, there were cancer cells in her skin at the site of Christina’s mastectomy.