A NEWPORT couple have moved a step further with their plan to move to a caravan in England to access a life-extending cancer drug after their application to Aneurin Bevan Health Board was rejected.

David Southwood and his wife Angela, of Lliswerry Road, are currently paying £3,711 a month for the drug from their life savings. But they can’t afford to carry on so have begun the process of registering with a GP in Somerset, England, where they can live in a caravan and get the drug for free on the NHS.

Angela Southwood said she could see a “dramatic” improvement in her husband since he started taking the drug at the beginning of November.

She said: “At this point I think it’s around 70 per cent likely we will be relocating to Burnham. Four weeks in and his appetite is back, he’s no longer short of breath, he’s no longer injecting insulin so it must be doing a lot of good.”

The couple will now be appealing the decision not to grant the drug on the Welsh NHS after they received a letter from Aneurin Bevan Health Board on Monday.

An Aneurin Bevan University Health Board spokesman said previously: “It would be inappropriate to comment on individual cases in detail.

“In some cases where a drug has not been made routinely available by the All Wales Medicines Strategy Group or National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) there is a process by which clinicians can provide evidence and apply for exceptionality, where they believe a patient would benefit with that drug.”

The Welsh Government has said: “In determining the effectiveness of medicines such as axitinib and their potential to benefit patients, we are guided by the recommendations of (NICE) and the All Wales Medicines Strategy Group.

“If either of these bodies recommends the use of a medicine it will be made available to patients in Wales for treatment of the relevant indication.

“Axitinib is currently being appraised by NICE and in March 2014, it issued interim guidance, for consultation. This guidance recommended axitinib as an option for the treatment of advanced renal cell carcinoma. We were expecting the final appraisal to be published in early summer but NICE suspended the process on June 20.

“We have had discussions with the manufacturer but currently have no information about when the appraisal will be completed.”