We need a clinically focused community pharmacy service that is better integrated with primary care and public health in line with the NHS Five Year Forward View. This will help relieve the pressure on GPs and A&E departments, ensure better use of medicines and better patient outcomes, and contribute to delivering seven-day health and care services. The Department of Health is therefore consulting on how best to introduce a Pharmacy Integration Fund to help transform the way pharmacists and community pharmacy will operate in the NHS, bringing clear benefits to patients and the public.
Spending on health continues to grow, with a £10 billion real terms increase in NHS funding in England between 2014/15 and 2020/21, of which £6billion will be delivered by the end of 2016/17. We expect to be spending up to an extra £2 billion per year on the new drugs that patients need by the end of 2020.
In the Spending Review the Government re-affirmed the need for the NHS to deliver £22 billion of efficiency savings by 2020/21 as the NHS itself set out in the Five Year Forward View. Community pharmacy is a core part of NHS primary care and has an important contribution to make as the service rises to these challenges. This will involve reductions in the amount of NHS funding for community pharmacies in England, as we ask the pharmacy sector to make savings in line with those elsewhere in the NHS.
These efficiencies can be made within community pharmacy without compromising the quality of services or public access to them. In some parts of the country there may be more pharmacies than are necessary to maintain good access. I understand that forty per cent of pharmacies are in clusters of three or more, meaning that two-fifths of pharmacies are within ten minutes’ walk of two or more other pharmacies. Our aim is to ensure that those community pharmacies upon which people depend continue to thrive and so are consulting on the introduction of a Pharmacy Access Scheme, which will provide more NHS funds to certain pharmacies compared with others, considering factors such as location and the health needs of the local population.
The Government is in detailed discussions with the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee and is consulting with the pharmacy sector and with patient and public organisations over the coming months on how to deliver these savings and achieve a new, modernised and integrated service.
Further information about the proposals can be found by clicking here
11.3.16
