UK’s medicine passports are multiplying, but access remains unproven

The UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) granted Innovation Passports on 9 November 2026 to three investigational medicines for lung cancer, Huntington’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease. The designations put the candidates into the Innovative Licensing and Access Pathway (ILAP), but do not approve them for use or guarantee NHS access.

The MHRA says Innovation Passports are for products that could address unmet clinical need and have the potential to deliver significant benefits for patients. One of the three candidates is a chemical small interfering RNA, or siRNA, designed to silence genes by cleaving messenger RNA.

ILAP is designed to bring developers into contact from early clinical development with the regulator, the national health system and health technology assessment bodies. Its partnership includes the MHRA, NHS England, NICE, the Scottish Medicines Consortium, the All Wales Therapeutics and Toxicology Centre, and the Department of Health Northern Ireland. The pathway combines the passport designation with a Target Development Profile and a toolkit intended to support development and approvals.

The latest designations follow Innovation Passports announced on 4 August for investigational products targeting liver cancer and dementia. That makes the pathway a recurring part of the UK’s 2026 medicines pipeline, rather than a one-off announcement. Its value will depend on whether coordinated early engagement helps candidates progress to authorisation and, where recommended, NHS access.

For patients and clinicians, a passport is an early signal of regulatory interest—not evidence that a treatment works or is ready to prescribe. The practical next step is to look for trial results and later decisions on marketing authorisation and health-system access; the passport itself does not settle those questions.