THE work of Dr Malcolm Stevens has always been a source of special pride to Bolton, his home town.

The former Bolton School pupil first discovered the revolutionary brain cancer drug Temodal.

However, he and others involved in the drug's development have been massively frustrated because many health authorities have refused to prescribe the drug. It costs an average of £1,000 a month per patient and was deemed simply too expensive.

Now, however, the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) has recommended that the drug's benefits outweigh its expense, and that it should become widely available.

They state that the quality of life for patients on the drug improve significantly. Ironically, because of the funding situation, the drug has been much more widely used outside the UK.

It was always a disgrace that people in this country with mid and high-grade brain tumours -- often bringing paralysis, loss of speech, personality changes and blindness -- were denied a drug that could help them.

Temodal, also known as temozolomide, can prolong life and relieve symptoms, and is used where surgery and radiotherapy have failed to combat the disease.

It also has fewer side effects than other treatments, so patients don't have to go into hospital to take it.

Cash-strapped health authorities are bound to look at the accounts before prescribing costly drugs for individuals in an attempt to balance the books and be fair to other patients.

Fortunately, in this case certainly, commonsense has prevailed. And thousands of ordinary men and women will now be able to have a better quality of life -- and the very chance of survival.