Reimbursement prices, rent and the national minimum wage are all impacting community pharmacy’s ability to stay on a sustainable trajectory - but funding is the biggest factor, according to respondents to C+D’s Counter View 25 survey.
Lack of funding is impacting how pharmacist’s role can “develop and continue safely”, said one respondent, while some responses were more animated, with one suggesting funding had been “set at a level to purposely destroy community pharmacy”.
Read more: ‘Ludicrous, dangerous, and designed to ensure destruction’
That echoed the sentiments of another respondent who said that “expectations are huge” but the contract is “deeply flawed”.
Others stressed the workload was too much and funding hasn’t kept in line with inflation.
“Funding needs to increase in line with inflation and workload,” one respondent said.
Read more: Medical cannabis: Is the pharmacy sector ready to roll?
“It hasn’t done that during the entirety of my career, therefore it is becoming ever more unsustainable.”
Services
High costs were mentioned as a continuing trend of unsustainability, but also the need for business rates to be cut.
One respondent said the situation had left them unable to pay wholesaler bills on time as the “remuneration is simply too dismal” and left their employer “worried all the time” about finances.
“We are professional, and we should be treated as such by the government,” they added.
Read more: AI and automation in pharmacy: Transformative, risky, or both?
Another respondent said there’d been a lack of commissioning available for pharmacies to grow into, but another questioned why pharmacies were doing more advanced services when “core services cannot be done sustainably”.
“It’s like finding out the land you want to build a house on has no foundations, but the builder says it’s okay because they will subsidise solar panels for your roof,” they quipped.
Qualifications
A fresh crop of pharmacists will graduate in September as independent prescribers, but one respondent was concerned this change risks allowing prescription-only medicines (POMs) to be “freely available to so many more people”.
Staff and pharmacist recruitment were singled out as a concern for the sector’s sustainability, while one respondent said there’s been a lack of career support for pharmacists.
They warned pharmacists will be “squeezed out” from community pharmacy to save costs.
Read more: What did you think about GPs? (and is ‘overpaid and lazy’ unfair?)
“As long as there are decent jobs in other sectors, that is fine,” they said. “But I think these companies expect others such as pharmacy technicians to fill the gap for less money. It is a race to the bottom.”
And as for the far-flung future, one respondent feels the path to sustainability will lead to two types of pharmacies.
“There will only be large stores, and everywhere else will make do with online pharmacy,” they said.
Read more: Online pharmacies: Convenience at the expense of safety?
“The UK treasury has a deficit of £20-50bn. There’s no chance for us.”
But others don’t speak quite so soon.
One respondent said millennials and Gen Z are “waiting for the late baby boomers to eventually retire and die out” so they can move in and get a grasp on pharmacy’s future.
Read more: Over half of pharmacies could ‘limit services’ over funding gap
“That will hopefully allow the next generation to begin rebuilding pharmacy for the future,” they said.
“The current contractors have a sense of entitlement like they fought in WW2 and are unwilling to be dethroned.”
