Pharmacists issue warning over NHS prescriptions sales risking closure of family chemists

Pharmacies are making a loss of up to £75 a pack on prescription drugs meaning many are closing, chemists have warned.

The National Pharmacy Association (NPA) said they are closing in “record numbers” due to an "utterly broken" payment system. It cited an example of one pharmacist making losses of £1,000 a month due to the mismatch in prices.

The is campaigning to save family chemists and stop the closures which are piling pressure on overstretched GPs.

Olivier Picard, a pharmacist in Berkshire, said: "This is affecting us enormously. The number of products that we cannot purchase under the reimbursement price is increasing and increasing, and the prices that we are seeing... the discrepancy is so huge. A couple of months ago, we were losing £20 a packet on a medicine for stroke prevention. The next month, we lost money on something that you give as an antidepressant. Sometimes it'll be a few pence, sometimes it'll be several pounds.

"There are some months where I am out of pocket by £1,000 pounds per pharmacy - I have got four pharmacies. It is not a sustainable model. It is not something that I can continue doing. Every month we dispense at a loss for dozens of medications."

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The NPA, which represents independent community pharmacies in the UK, said financial pressure on pharmacies has forced 1,500 to have closed permanently in England in the past decade. It conducted a snapshot survey on October 7 of drug prices from pharmacy wholesalers and compared it to how much pharmacies are reimbursed through the NHS Drug Tariff, funded by the Department of Health and Social Care. The NPA found:

• Amantadine, a drug to treat the symptoms of Parkinson's, cost pharmacies £94.05 per pack to buy from suppliers, but the drugs tariff pays £18.06 per pack. The NPA said that a pharmacy dispensing this medicine to a patient would lose £75.99 per 56 tablet pack.
• Pharmacies are paid £1.72 to dispense a pack of Escitalopram, a common anti-depressant. But it costs them £9.08 to buy from suppliers.
• Anti-anxiety medication Lorazepam costs £10.75 to buy from a wholesaler but pharmacies are paid £3.16 to dispense it.
• Pharmacies can buy etoricoxib, an anti-inflammatory drug to treat conditions such as rheumatoid , for £19.47 from their supplier but they only receive £6.75 to dispense the medication.

Pharmacies cannot stop supplying medicines because of cost because this would put them in breach of their contract with the health service, experts said. Earlier this year an NPA poll revealed that 85% of community pharmacies say that they "often" make a net loss on NHS prescribing. Meanwhile the survey of around 500 small independent community pharmacies, also found 36% feared they will be forced to close within a year due to financial pressures.

Paul Rees, NPA chief executive, added: "It is nothing short of a national scandal that pharmacies have to dig deep into their own pockets just to cover the cost of basic medicines that they dispense to patients in need of treatment. No other health professional would be asked subsidise a key NHS service. The system for funding the medicines upon which millions of patients rely is utterly broken. Pharmacists are left tearing their hair out.”

Health Secretary Wes Streeting has promised to redirect more NHS funding to primary care to keep people out of .