Pharmacists have said the sector is facing its own crisis after the UK government was reportedly considering enlisting their help during NHS strikes.
They say pharmacists are more than capable of carrying out some diagnoses and prescriptions, but the sector is under the same crippling pressure as the NHS.
Fin McCaul, a fellow of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS), said the plan would be “categorically impossible” unless pharmacies receive more funding.
McCaul, who has been a pharmacist for more than 30 years, said chemists were “technically” more than capable of carrying out such plans, but community pharmacies are already on their knees because they are “grossly underfunded.”
“Half the pharmacies in the country are struggling to keep their doors open,“ he said. ”We’re not even funded enough to do the core.”
“To take this on with no increase in core funding, with no new funding, would be categorically impossible,” he said.
But he believes it makes “far more sense” for the pharmacies take on the responsibility on a routine basis because they have access to “patients, the medicines, and the testing to make sure they can have the antibiotics and to check they have the UTIs [urinary tract infections], strep throat, or whatever it is.”
Pharmacist and former regional RPS representative Reena Barai, who runs a family chemist in Sutton, echoed McCaul’s scepticism over the reported plans without more funding.
“Ironically this is something we’ve been asking for for months already, but like I say the Treasury haven’t come forward with the funding for this really valuable service,” she said.
Barai said pharmacists are already dealing with a cocktail of issues including medicine supply problems and workforce shortages, adding it would “buckle the whole sector” if they are asked to take on “this sort of level of service.”
Janet Morrison, chief executive of the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee , an industry body representing chemists, also said pharmacies have “the skills, ambition, and accessibility to help,” but are now “approaching their own crisis as years of underfunding, efficiency squeezes, and workforce problems take their toll.”
Leyla Hannbeck, CEO of the Association of Independent Multiple Pharmacies, another industry body that represents more than 4,000 businesses, also told iNews that the sector “simply cannot do it without additional funding.”
Conservative Party chairman Nadhim Zahawi on Sunday refused to rule out using pharmacists to ease the pressure on the NHS caused by industrial action from nurses and other staff.
Speaking on Sky News’ “Sophy Ridge On Sunday” programme, the minister said the NHS will “look at all contingency planning” and that the government has to ensure there was a “minimum safety level of delivery” in place in the health service.
Zahawi also urged unions for nurses and public sectors to back down from their demands on pay, saying the cost is “unsustainable.”
“To ask for a 19 percent pay rise which would cost the NHS £10 billion [$12 billion]. I think is the wrong thing to do right now,” he said, adding that it would cost around £28 billion ($34 billion)—nearly £1,000 ($1,218)—to accept ”all the inflation-level pay rises.”
Soaring inflation this year has prompted workers from a number of public and private sectors to strike or threaten to strike over pay, including rail workers, postal workers, teachers, barristers, ambulance crews, firefighters, and Border Force staff.
In an unprecedented move, nurses in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland will stage strikes next month. The Royal College of Nursing said experienced nurses’ salaries are 20 percent worse in real terms compared to 10 years earlier, demanding a pay rise of 5 percent above inflation, which Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said is “simply unreasonable and unaffordable.”
The government on Monday launched an eight-week consultation on plans to overhaul NHS pension rules, including a proposal to introduce “partial retirement flexibilities,” in an attempt to retain more senior doctors in the service.
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