If the government commissions “a national walk-in smoking cessation service” for pharmacies across England, ten times as many people would be encouraged to quit, the Company Chemists’ Association (CCA) has said.
In a report published today, CCA analysis found that such a service would help more than 200,000 people quit smoking every year.
Looking to the Scottish nationally commissioned service, it said this “accounted for over two thirds of all quit attempts made in Scotland in 2023/24” with pharmacies supporting “over 21,000 to set a quit date”.
And by “simply scaling the number of quit attempts in Scotland to the English population”, this would “indicate over 225,000 quit attempts every year,” it added.
Read more: AstraZeneca: Let Tobacco pay for pharmacy ‘stop smoking’ service
The trade association acknowledged there is “some support currently available” in England, but that these services “are not meeting demand” and are “not adequately addressing health inequalities”.
The national smoking cessation service (SCS) is “vastly underused” with only 11,728 consultations taking place between April 2024 and March 2025, it said.
Of these, less than half were “recorded in the 20% most deprived communities”, it said, stressing this reaffirms “the need for targeted action in deprived communities where the burden of smoking is highest”.
Unequal access
“As support and access vary by location, people do not have a clear and consistent route to get help, meaning that those seeking support often face unequal access to services,” the CCA added.
It argued that a nationally commissioned community pharmacy smoking cessation service would end the “inconsistent availability of access” by creating a “single, clear route for patients”.
“If every pharmacy offered a walk-in service, more than 225,000 people could be supported annually,” it reiterated, explaining that this is a “more than 10-fold increase” compared to the current 15,000.
Read more: Updated smoking cessation service spec released
The CCA report also requested that the government “continue to implement” booking and referral standards “to allow other healthcare professionals to easily refer” patients to community pharmacy.
And it urged policymakers to “support pharmacies to invest in their workforce”.
CCA chief executive Malcolm Harrison said “the current system of local commissioning is failing to provide consistent, accessible support to people who want to stop smoking”.
Read more: Pharmacy stop-smoking service expands to ‘non-registered’ staff
“A national smoking cessation service commissioned through community pharmacies would end the postcode lottery and help stub out the impact that smoking has on the nation’s health and economy once-and-for all.”
And National Pharmacy Association (NPA) chief executive Henry Gregg joined the CCA’s call for a nationally commissioned service, arguing that it will “reach much larger numbers of people and help reduce rates of smoking”.
It comes after an AstraZeneca report published last week said that the government should “consider implementing a levy” on tobacco companies to fund a “national walk-in stop smoking service” in pharmacies.
