The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) accepted and published 22 written submissions in their call for evidence, including the evidence submitted by the PDA. The PDA’s evidence focused on one aspect that the PAC is interested in. The focus of the PDA’s submission was the barrier created for patients to access treatment and support recovery when a pharmacy closed temporarily.
The PDA has been actively bringing to the attention of policymakers and legislators the impact that temporary pharmacy closures have on patients. This impact can often affect the most vulnerable patients. Pharmacies with an NHS contract have a contractual obligation to observe their opening hours as part of their agreement with the NHS to provide a continuity of pharmaceutical services to their local neighbourhoods.
For this particular inquiry, the PDA wanted to draw to the attention of the PAC published information together with data that the PDA had received from Freedom of Information requests which showed the wide scale and GB-wide nature of temporary pharmacy closures. The PDA also wanted to bring to the attention of the inquiry the disproportionate number of temporary closures which could be attributed to members of the largest chains (those represented by the Company Chemists Association).
The PDA highlighted the unique nature of the service that pharmacists provide, including their role in supervising methadone consumption by patients on a daily basis. Pharmacists ensure that individuals who are accessing treatment to support their recovery from addiction to illegal drugs can do so in a safe and appropriate environment.
The evidence included information about the special storage, handling, and record-keeping requirements for controlled drugs and that many pharmacies did not routinely keep any stock of these special items. The PDA included examples from published sources around the impact on individuals when access to lawful supplies of controlled drugs was interrupted (even if that interruption was for one single day).
The work of the Public Account Committee Inquiry can be found here.
The PDA’s evidence can be found here.
Learn more
- Reducing the harm from illegal drugs
- PDA written evidence to the Public Account Inquiry – Reducing the harm from illegal drugs
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