Patients should be allowed to top up their healthcare by paying for expensive and experimental drugs without being billed for the entire cost of their NHS care, doctors’ leaders said yesterday.

But they stopped short of demanding that the UK Government allow patients the right to make co-payments, saying that this could lead to a two-tier health service.

According to reports by the British Medical Association (BMA), there is a real fear that co-payments could be the first stage of a “slippery slope” where a patient’s ability to pay defines what treatment they receive – some doctors have argued that this is the first nail in the lid of the NHS’ coffin.

However, denying patients the right to make co-payments could deny some the right to life because they cannot afford the huge cost of paying for all their NHS care.

Dr Tony Calland, from Monmouthshire, said: “If you prohibit co-payments but also prohibit access to certain life-saving drugs, you are consigning everyone who chooses to be in the NHS to the lowest common denominator of treatment possible.

“This means that Britain will slide down the international league tables for outcomes for diseases like cancer.”

Dr Calland added that should co-payments be prohibited, it could paradoxically speed up the demise of the NHS because those who have the ability to pay for additional health insurance cover will seek to do so leading to commercial and private companies to fill the gaps with new facilities.