The second consecutive record month for drug price concessions is “indicative of volatility in the supply chain”, Community Pharmacy England (CPE) has warned.
The negotiator said yesterday that 205 price concessions were announced for April, and there are “further requests still being negotiated”.
It comes after drug price concessions reached a three-year high of 174 in February, and March saw a record 201 concessions announced.
Read more: ‘Concerning’: Drug price concessions highest in three years
CPE said the latest increase marks a “concerning trend” that reflects “fragility and instability in the medicines supply chain, which is being intensified by the ongoing situation in the Middle East”.
It added that it was “deeply concerned about the impact this instability” is having on pharmacies, and that it is becoming “an ever more complex and time-consuming job” for them to procure medicines.
“Under increasing pressure”
CPE’s research and insights director James Davies said that while price concessions “indicate pricing issues rather than necessarily meaning there are medicines shortages, they show that the medicines supply chain is under increasing pressure”.
And the situation “is only likely to get worse in light of the conflict in the Middle East”, he added.
Davies stressed that community pharmacies are “spending hours every day trying to get the medicines their patients need” and this is “also having a financial impact”.
Evidence
CPE thanked pharmacy owners for this month submitting “thousands of reports” which have “been analysed to create evidence for price concessions”.
The negotiator said it has “made representations on behalf of pharmacy owners to the Department of Health and Social Care” and “carried out detailed negotiations on these products to secure improved prices”.
Read more: ‘This isn’t temporary’: NPA warns of ‘spiralling’ drug costs
“As a result of our representations, some prices have increased from those initially announced earlier in the month,” it said.
And it added that it continues to “argue for fair medicines pricing to support pharmacy owners” and “press the government for wider solutions to the ongoing volatility in the supply chain”.
Read more: NHS England ‘really worried’ about med supplies, chief exec warns
It comes as the National Pharmacy Association this week told C+D that the government “must step in to help pharmacies” with “spiralling” drug prices.
And it follows NHS England’s chief executive in April raising concerns that certain medicine supplies could run out within weeks or even days due to the war in the Middle East.
