Swiss drugmaker Roche Holding AG announced that the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) recommended the use of lung-cancer drug Tarceva (erlotinib) in patients with non small-cell lung cancer. NICE didn’t recommend Tarceva as a second-choice treatment for advanced or spreading non-small cell lung cancer in patients who can’t tolerate Taxotere.

NICE’s recommendation was achieved after Roche Holding AG lower 7.5 percent Tarceva’s price. Therefore a 125 day treatment with Tarceva will cost some 9.625 dollars against previous 10.281 dollars.

Tarceva (Erlotinib) is recommended as an alternative to Taxotere (docetaxel) for patients with non-small-cell lung cancer who have already tried one chemotherapy regimen but it has not worked. Tarceva should be used only when the manufacturer provides the drug at the same overall treatment cost as Taxotere. This cost includes the cost of giving the drug, treatments for any side effects and the cost of monitoring patients to check that treatment is working.

The government agency did not previously recommend the product as it was considered too expensive to be used by the NHS. Tarceva is an unusual drug as it is prescribed orally opposed to other cancer-drugs that are prescribed injectable.

Tarceva was approved in the United Kingdom in 2005, and had global sales during the first nine months of the year of 849 milion dollars. On the other hand Sanofi’s Taxotere had sales of 2.282 million dollars for the same period.

Genentech Inc., majority-owned by Basel, Switzerland-based Roche, and partner OSI Pharmaceuticals Inc. market Tarceva in the U.S. Chugai Pharmaceutical Co. sells the medicine in Japan. Roche markets the treatment in the rest of the world.