(RAF 1323734 - 187868) Patrick David Reyre - Course 70

2007 - A former Second World War bomber pilot who is losing his sight has been denied a new drug on the NHS that could save his vision. Patrick Reyre, 85, of Taunton, who is registered disabled because of his failing sight and has to live on GBP155 a week pension and benefits, has now decided to fund the treatment, costing up to GBP4,000, himself. "I feel very disillusioned. You are hailed as a hero one day and then you have to endure the misery of losing your sight. It is a bitter pill," said Mr Reyre, who was also an RAF test pilot. (Update - By Alex Cameron - Somerset County Gazette October 1, 2008) A decision to make a sight-saving drug routinely available on the NHS has been welcomed as a partial victory by a Taunton campaigner. Mark Formosa, the Conservative Parliamentary candidate for Taunton Deane, has been pressing for more than 18 months for all elderly people to be allowed the drugs Lucentis and Macugen on the NHS. The drugs help save the sight of people suffering from wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD). He took up the issue after being contacted by Taunton pensioner Patrick Reyre, a World War Two bomber pilot, who was going blind because of AMD. Mr Reyre, now aged 86, was refused treatment by the NHS trust which runs Musgrove Park Hospital, Taunton, despite being just weeks away from losing the sight in his one good eye. The publicity generated from Mr Formosa's intervention resulted in the owner of the Daily Express newspaper meeting the £4,000 cost of Mr Reyre's treatment privately. Mr Formosa said: "It is a disgrace that until now, drugs which can save the eyesight of people such as Mr Reyre were available on the NHS only in some part of the country but not others because it was left to the discretion of individual health trusts. “I am delighted that Lucentis is now being made available everywhere, but at the same time I am disappointed with the refusal of NICE to approve the routine use of Macugen. "Every day that NICE delays allowing Macugen to be prescribed is a day when another 100 people across the country start to lose their sight.”