Which major pharmacy groups reported the biggest number of temporary closures?
More than 20,000 temporary community pharmacy closures were reported in England over a 12-month period, but a larger proportion of some employers’ branches were affected more than others. C+D investigates
A C+D analysis – based on data* from NHS England (NHSE) following a freedom-of-information (FOI) request – found that 3,660 pharmacies across England had reported at least one instance of closing temporarily between 1 October 2021 and 30 September 2022.
Not all of these instances involved the pharmacy closing for a full day, with some only affected for a matter of hours.
Read more: Revealed: The reasons behind temporary pharmacy closures
While the affected pharmacies reported temporarily closing a total of 20,924 times, some pharmacy groups reported more instances of closures than others.
And a greater proportion of some pharmacy companies’ branches were worse affected by temporary closures, according to C+D’s analysis.
Find out below how many instances of temporary closures were reported by the different groups, and the most common reasons for the closures provided by each company.
Lloydspharmacy
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 987
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 869
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Number of instances reported: 7,461
Eighty-eight per cent of Lloydspharmacy’s branches in England reported closing temporarily in the period covered by C+D’s analysis.
In 3,975 instances – representing 53% of the total reported by the multiple – the reason for closure was attributed to “locum could not be found”. Meanwhile, “no cover found” was submitted on 427 occasions.
Read more: Temporary closures: C+D reporter discusses scale of problem on BBC
“Short notice staff sickness” was provided as a reason for closing 430 times over the 12-month period.
Lloydspharmacy told C+D it had no other details to add when approached for comment.
Rowlands
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 313
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 274
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Number of instances reported: 1,088
A similar percentage (87.5%) of Rowlands branches covered by C+D’s analysis reported temporarily closing on at least one occasion.
In 296 instances, Rowlands branches attributed closures to “short notice staff sickness”. Meanwhile, in 267 cases, another box for ‘other’ reasons behind a closure that asked the pharmacy for more information was ticked, the data for which was not provided to C+D** by either NHSE or Rowlands.
The reason “locum could not be found” was flagged in 187 instances and “no cover found” was shared for 29 episodes of closures.
Read more: Locum pharmacist rate woes: how much are they getting for shifts?
A Rowlands Pharmacy spokesperson told C+D that “all temporary closures are unplanned and we make every attempt to cover a branch with employed or locum resource”.
They continued: “Given the high demand for locums across the sector, that can be challenging. If there is high absence in a particular area, that clearly increases the demand and pressure on resource – this particularly relates to COVID-19 and the absences seen [at the] end of 2021 and early 2022.”
“We take our patient obligations extremely seriously and will only temporarily close a branch as a last resort,” they added.
Well
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 553
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 405
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Number of instances reported: 1,306
The percentage of Well pharmacies in England impacted by temporary closures was 73%, according to C+D’s analysis.
“Locum could not be found” was provided as a reason in 344 instances, while “no cover found” was behind 49 instances of closures.
“Short notice staff sickness” was shared as a reason for closure 265 times.
A Well Pharmacy spokesperson told C+D that “closing pharmacies…isn’t something we take lightly”.
“In a small number of cases relative to our overall opening hours, we have to take the difficult decision to temporarily close a pharmacy or pause pharmacy provision due to lack of pharmacist availability or team member shortages,” they added.
“Our pharmacy, regional, and central teams work hard to keep all our pharmacies open and minimise the disruption our patients and customers experience. We apologise to customers who have been impacted by any of these closures and thank them for their patience.”
Boots
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 1,692
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 1,063
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Number of instances reported: 6,031
Meanwhile, 63% of Boots branches in England had to temporarily tweak their opening hours, according to the data provided by NHSE.
Boots branches reported closing because a “locum could not be found” in 3,516 instances, while “no cover found” was provided as a reason in 120 instances.
“Short notice staff sickness” was submitted as an explanation for closing in 1,136 instances.
Read more: MPs push government for funded pharmacy workforce plan
Commenting on the data, a Boots spokesperson told C+D that “there have been occasions when we have had to temporarily reduce opening hours at stores as a result of pharmacist availability”.
But they added that “this is always a last resort, and our teams work very hard to keep stores open and minimise disruption for patients”.
When closures occur, Boots “always” tries to direct patients to a nearby pharmacy, they said.
“There are currently industry-wide challenges with pharmacist resource,” the spokesperson added.
Asda
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 238
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 149
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Number of instances reported: 749
Over six in 10 (63%) of Asda pharmacies reported closing temporarily over the 12-month period under C+D’s analysis.
“Locum could not be found” was given as a reason in 243 instances, while “no cover found” was provided in 76 instances.
“Short notice staff sickness” was another prevalent reason given for closing, reported on 99 occasions.
Asda decided not to comment on this occasion.
Tesco
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 351
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 180
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Number of instances reported: 1,259
More than half (51%) of Tesco pharmacies in England reported closing temporarily during the 12-month period.
The affected branches said that in 874 instances, they had to close because a “locum could not be found”, while “no cover found” was given as a reason in 39 instances.
Read more: Tesco Pharmacy stands by controversial leaflets in temporary closure latest
“Short notice staff sickness” was provided in 85 instances.
Tesco said that the data obtained by C+D shows that all major pharmacy groups are affected by a skills shortage, and the same applies to the wider NHS.
The chain works hard to ensure cover is in place in those areas where demand is challenging and does all it can to keep its branches open, C+D understands.
Weldricks
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 59
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 57
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Number of instances reported: 482
Almost all of Weldricks Pharmacy branches (97%) under C+D's analysis were impacted by temporary closures during the period covered by the investigation.
“Locum could not be found” was given as a reason in 219 instances, while “short notice staff sickness” was shared 152 times.
Read more: ‘Unfair advantage’: PCNs see increase in reimbursable pay for pharmacists
Commenting on this data, a spokesperson for the independent chain told C+D that “most closures have been for a few hours while alternative pharmacist cover was secured due to unexpected sickness or absence”.
“Dealing with short-term, unplanned absences has been made very difficult by the nationwide unplanned migration of thousands of experienced community pharmacists from pharmacies into GP surgeries,” they added.
C+D understands that the regional NHS England team is satisfied with how Weldricks reports temporary pharmacy closures, no matter how small they are.
Peak Pharmacy
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Total number of branches listed by NHSE: 77
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Number of pharmacies impacted by closures: 62
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Number of instances reported: 296
According to the data obtained by C+D, 80.5% of Peak Pharmacy branches reported temporary closures over the 12-month period, with the reason “locum could not be found” featuring 131 times, and “short notice staff sickness” provided 80 times.
A spokesperson for the independent chain told C+D that “staff sickness can be very hard to predict”.
Read more: Lack of funding and workforce issues to blame for temporary closures, say LPCs
“We pride ourselves in having a strong network of employed relief pharmacists and also locum pharmacists, but if they are not available, we may have to suspend a local pharmacy service temporarily in line with the responsible pharmacist legislation.
“This situation reflects the national shortage of qualified pharmacists, which is a challenge for us and all other pharmacy businesses across the sector,” they added.
The wider debate
While several of the companies analysed by C+D referred to a shortage of pharmacists in their comments, this has often been disputed during recent months.
Some have argued that there is instead a lack of pharmacists willing to work in the sector in its current state.
In October, the Department of Health and Social Care told C+D that it is “monitoring temporary closures of community pharmacies”, but in May it said that community pharmacy employers are ultimately responsible for attracting and retaining their staff.
Catch up with C+D’s sixth Big Debate, which asked: Is there a shortage of community pharmacists?
With the pharmacist profession still on the shortage occupation list, what can employers do to attract and retain their workforce?
Catch up on last night’s (November 15) Big Debate to discuss what needs to be done to make community pharmacy a more attractive career offer.
*Caveats on C+D’s analysis
NHSE provided reasons for closure by each ODS code (a pharmacy's unique identifying code). However, in calculating the total of instances of closures, it did not factor in the ODS codes without a corresponding trading name and the instances without a corresponding closure date.
These represent around 2.6% of the total reasons provided and have been excluded from C+D’s analysis.
NHSE only provided the duration of closures (in hours) for some pharmacies. Because this dataset was incomplete, this metric has been left out of C+D’s analysis.
C+D has asked NHSE for the full data on the duration of closures.
Any ODS code corresponding to an online pharmacy has been excluded from this analysis.
**Some pharmacies had selected “other, please fill column U” as a reason for closing temporarily, according to the dataset shared by NHSE. C+D has asked NHSE to share the data entered under “column U”, which was not provided by the commissioning body.
