The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has announced that from 1st May 2024, the NHS prescription charge will increase from £9.65 to £9.90 per prescription item. Amendments to the National Health Service (Charges for Drugs and Appliances) Regulations have been laid before Parliament which introduces changes not just for the NHS prescription charge but also for prescription prepayment certificates (PPCs), including the Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) PPC. The cost of a three-month PPC will become £32.05, whilst a 12-month PPC is increasing to £114.50 and the HRT PPC will increase to £19.80.
PPCs offer some savings for those needing any four or more prescription items in three months, or 12 or more items in a year but this can only be realised if the patient has the cashflow to enable them to pay in advance.
Prescription charges have ended in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, yet in England research from the Prescription Charges Coalition during 2023 found that nearly 10% of respondents had skipped medication in the past year due to the cost of prescriptions and this increased their physical and mental health problems, as well as impacted the time they took off work. A further survey of more than 1,000 pharmacists in January 2024 showed that 97% had seen patients in England decline medicines due to prescription charges, with more than a quarter saying this is happening increasingly often.
In February the PDA and other members of the Prescription Charges Coalition delivered a letter to the DHSC calling on the government to freeze prescription charges as a minimum (pictured below). However, the government have decided to apply an increase.
Paul Day, Director of Membership & Communities at the Pharmacists’ Defence Association said, ”The Westminster government have had multiple chances to do the right thing. We want NHS England to abolish prescription charges and be like the other UK nations. If they won’t do that, then they should review the exception list to reflect the diagnosis and treatment available today as has been requested constantly by the Prescription Charges Coalition; and if they won’t do that either we said that they should at least have frozen the charge.
They have chosen none of these options, and instead decided to further increase this charge during a cost of living crisis. That choice will negatively impact some of the the most vulnerable patients and families in the country, and it is likely that as a result even more patients declining the medicine that a health professional has prescribed for them. Pharmacists want to care for their patients, and are frustrated by a system which means n practice many patients cannot afford to have the medicines they need, We also reiterate that Pharmacists should not be treated as tax collectors.
We believe this increase is the wrong decision.”
Laura Cockram, Head of Campaigns at Parkinson’s UK and Chair of the Prescription Charges Coalition, said, “The NHS prescription charge price increase will strike fear into people living with long-term health conditions, such as Parkinson’s. People are already struggling financially due to the cost of living crisis, and increasing the prescription charge will result in more people missing, reducing, or delaying taking their medication, meaning their condition will deteriorate.
Recent research from the Royal Pharmaceutical Society and the Pharmacists’ Defence Association revealed that more than a third of pharmacists (35%) said they have seen an increase in patients declining prescriptions in the last 12 months. This increase will only lead to a greater cost to health and social services and avoidable hospital admissions.”
Photography by Jess Hurd
Learn more
- PDA deliver open letter to DHSC
- Pharmacists report the negative impact of prescription charges
- Prescription Charges Coalition
- Campaigning with others
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