NICE is a regulatory group set up to make sure that the drugs prescribed by the NHS are cost-effective.

When relatives are told the NHS will not fund a drug that would keep a loved one alive for precious months who can blame them for thinking Nice is a pitiless institution set up to deny life and happiness?

The truth, of course, is rather less black-and-white. The NHS never had a bottomless pit of money. These days its budgets are under scrutiny like never before.

So Nice faces an unenviable task – controlling the purse strings and acting to rein in spending, even where lives are at stake.

About half the drugs submitted to Nice are cancer treatments. Some have won regulatory approval, but plenty, such as the bone marrow cancer treatment azacitidine, have been turned down or are still pending.

Each rejection is a personal tragedy for patients such as John Pagella, from Bolam, and their families.

The Government has set aside £50m to fund expensive cancer treatments.

For Mr Pagella’s sake, we hope some of that money will help fund a course of azacitidine.

But in the longer term we need something better.

The huge cost of developing and testing drugs is making each new generation more expensive than the last.

Doctors already fear that the NHS may not be able to afford the cutting edge treatments just around the corner.

Politicians need to be honest about the funding gap between what is available and what the NHS can afford.

Even in difficult times, we believe a civilised society has to grasp the nettle and look at ways of filling it.