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A bitter pill to swallow

Document Cited in Related
Vincent
Published date25 April 2024
Publication titleBirmingham Mail (England)
Always smiley and helpful, always patient with what appears to be a permanent queue of mildly anxious customers, always willing to offer advice where they can

There's a discreet little room at the back where you can go for a chat or to have your blood pressure taken and, given I pop in regularly for a repeat prescription, we've come to know each other reasonably well.

But something's been off there in the last few months.

The pharmacy has suddenly and inexplicably started to close for an hour over lunch - something which never used to happen and which has caught me out several times.

Meanwhile, a couple of familiar faces seem to have gone from behind the counter.

And where once I'd get three months' worth of medicine per prescription, now it's down to two - which, of course, bumps up the cost.

Of course in the chaos of life - and perhaps overshadowed by the permanent noise surrounding the funding crisis within the NHS - I didn't join up the dots of these apparently random facts.

That was until this week when I popped in and picked up a leaflet from the counter which had the stark headline: Pharmacy Funding in Crisis.

It told me that the Government has reduced and then frozen funding to pharmacies since 2016.

'We're being asked to do more work for less money' it stated.

Then, under 'implications' it detailed how funding for the delivery of medicines - introduced during the pandemic - had stopped and patients may now be asked to contribute. There were stock shortages thanks to Brexit, workforce issues and the effect of war in the Ukraine.

Pharmacy staff through us all the

Mounting workforce pressures have also meant reduced hours and in...

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