THE FRIEND of an Usk woman who has been denied life-prolonging cancer drugs has said she is “thrilled” with the response to her online petition on a major website.

Julie McGowan set up the petition after her friend, Ann Wilkinson, was denied Avastin by the Aneurin Bevan Health Board’s individual patient funding request (IPFR) panel earlier this year — even though it is available on the NHS in England.

Mrs McGowan wants all cancer patients in Wales to have access to a cancer drugs fund and began promoting the petition on the change.org website last week. Since then the number of supporters has rocketed from about 2,500 to over 53,000 yesterday afternoon.

She said: “It’s gone berserk. The signature total is going up all the time. A lot of people did not realise there was a difference between England and Wales.

“I would have been happy if we got to 5,000 signatures. And when it got to that I said ‘let’s increase it to 10,000’. I am thrilled’.

“It is making a huge difference to Ann and other patients who are looking at this because it makes them feel like people care.”

Mrs Wilkinson, of New Market Street, who has had cancer for three years, started a course of £6,000 treatment, including Avastin, at Nevill Hall Hospital in Abergavenny, that was paid for by family. Mrs McGowan said her friend is “tolerating it” but the impact of treatment will only be known in coming months when scans are completed.

Mrs McGowan said she was hoping to take the petition to Westminster as well as the Welsh Assembly to demonstrate the breadth of support the campaign has around the country.

In response to Mrs Wilkinson’s case, the Aneurin Bevan Health Board has previously said that “clinical exceptionality” has to be proven before a patient can receive treatment outside of the guidance issued by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).