Cancer patients that use crowdfunding to raise funds for private treatment soaring. There were 2,348 appeals on the website NHS last year compared to 304 in 2015. The fundraiser generated £4,670,143 to help pay for private medical treatment at clinics in the UK and abroad. A significant rise from £530,519 in 2015. The National Health Service is the publicly funded national health care system in England.
Consultant oncologist Dr. Clive Peedell described the situation as “very wrong.” Patients might be trying treatments that are not appropriate for their needs. The system for approving effective new cancer drugs is not perfect, but has improved in the past years. Most of the approved and proven effective treatments for cancer were funded by the NHS. One of which is the immunotherapy for a number of indications including lung cancer.
Liz Sheppard, from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, raised £135,000 online. The fund raising was for her private immunotherapy treatment. She was diagnosed with cancer small cell stomach cancer, in November 2015. She spent £60,000 of the money and is responding well to treatment.
Liz said that if it was not for people’s generosity she would not be where she is now. According to The Telegraph, NHS England said the immunotherapy treatment nivolumab was already available on the NHS. The NHS has helped so many cancer patients that are seeking help in the website.
According to The Times, The X-Men actor James McAvoy, met Kelly Turner, 16, at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London this week. McAvoy has donated £50,000 to teenager Turner for her life-saving cancer treatment. Kelly, from Dover, was given two years to live when the rare form of cancer. She was diagnosed with desmoplastic round cell tumors in October 2015. She needed a total of £1 million to be treated in New York.
The NHS, funded primarily by taxation, provides free or low-cost health care. All legal residents of the U.K. Medications are subsidized as well and prescriptions may be free when situations warrant. Cancer patients who need crowdfunding could contact the organization for assistance.
