Curtis LancasterBBC News, South of England
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A survey by Community Pharmacy claims 63% of pharmacies could close in the next year
“I’ve never been busier but never been more skint,” says a pharmacist who is calling for more government funding for the industry.
Mike Hewitson from Beaminster, Dorset, says increases in the national living wage, national insurance and the cost of medicine have left businesses like his “creaking under the pressure”.
His comments follow a a survey by Community Pharmacy England in which 63% of pharmacies said they could close in the next year without further support.
The government blamed the situation on a “decade of underfunding” and said this year it had given the sector a bigger funding boost than any other part of the NHS.
Mr Hewitson believes pharmacies are a “lifeline” in many communities where patients struggle to get an appointment to see their GP.
He says: “Pharmacies increasingly are struggling to cover the cost of doing business, whether that’s buying medicines on behalf of the NHS for their patients, whether that’s paying their staff or vital repairs.”
His pharmacy has a leaky roof that he cannot afford to have fixed because he says he is prioritising paying his staff and paying for medicine.
In some cases, pharmacies are having to “subsidise the NHS and the supply of medicines to individual patients,” Mr Hewitson claims.
The Community Pharmacy England survey found that 73% of pharmacy team members reported supply issues are putting patients health at risk.
‘Underfunding and neglect’
In response, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care told the BBC: “Community pharmacists are at the heart of local healthcare and we’re working to turn around a decade of underfunding and neglect that has left the sector on the brink of collapse.
“We want them to play a bigger role as we shift care out of hospitals and into the community through our Plan for Change, and this year we gave community pharmacies a bigger funding boost than any other area of the NHS.”