ANY of the beancounters who will sometimes put pounds ahead of patients should read Rachel Aldridge’s comments today.

Ms Aldridge was diagnosed with bowel cancer last year and it has since spread to her liver. She has been told it is incurable.

However, on Wednesday a new form of treatment, called Selective Internal Radiation Treatment, was made available at the Churchill Hospital under a two-year trial. It is one of 10 hospitals where it will be available. It is a form of radiotherapy that specifically targets the liver and Ms Aldridge, a training co-ordinator at Abingdon and Witney College, hopes that it will prolong her life.

“I feel so lucky that researchers out there have created this treatment for cancer,” she told us. “It’s amazing to think it could prolong my life with my four children.”

That demonstrates why our researchers work away at treatments like this and why funding is so important.

Cancer sufferers are not statistics or figures on a balance sheet.

They are real people with real lives. Every extra day that Ms Aldridge gets is precious to her and her four children.

The treatment was removed from the Cancer Drugs Fund for NHS treatment, meaning that it was only available privately.

Now it is hoped 40 people a year may benefit during this trial – another 79 Ms Aldridges.

Of course there is no limitless fund for health. As we also report today, Oxfordshire’s Clinical Commissioning Group is facing a financial armageddon over the coming years.

So while these arguments over funding of health continue we have to remember why the NHS is there. It is for people like Ms Aldridge and her children, Bridie, Chloe, James and Oliver.