“There are no current plans to allow patients to directly nominate a DSP from within the NHS App,” health minister Baroness Merron yesterday (July 14) revealed.
However, she added that “patients can continue to nominate a DSP through existing routes, which currently provide a more seamless patient experience”.
Read more: CPE: New DSPs banned as they ‘undermine’ bricks-and-mortars
The comment came in a written response to a parliamentary question from shadow health minister Lord Kamall.
Kamall had asked whether the Department of Health and Social Care (DH) plans to “develop NHS App functionality to allow patients to nominate a DSP directly within the app”.
No new DSPs
It comes after Community Pharmacy England (CPE) last month announced new legislation to stop any new DSPs from opening, amid concerns that they “undermine” bricks-and-mortar pharmacies.
“From June 23, no new DSP applications can be accepted”, it revealed, explaining to C+D that the regulatory change was agreed as part of the sector’s funding deal but was not announced at the time.
Read more: ‘Anti-competitive’ contract favours bricks-and-mortars, DSPs protest
According to the negotiator, the decision was made “for a number of reasons”, including that “there are approximately 400 DSP pharmacies currently in operation”.
This “should be more than sufficient for England”, it stressed.
Meanwhile, the Independent Pharmacy Cooperative Network (IPCN) submitted a complaint to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) “on behalf of its DSP members” in April, arguing that the new pharmacy contract is “anti-competitive”.
Read more: NHS App AI tool to direct patients to pharmacies by 2028
It told the CMA that the new pharmacy contract “significantly distorts fair market conditions by favouring bricks-and-mortar pharmacies”.
And it added that “this agreement…will prohibit DSPs from providing enhanced and advanced NHS services onsite from October 2025” and “removes their ability to compete on equal terms despite holding identical NHS contracts to community pharmacies”.
