New Community Pharmacy England (CPE) data shows 96% of pharmacy owners are either “concerned” or “very concerned” that “their business may not survive this winter” as it calls for “urgent financial support”, it revealed today (December 19).
The negotiator’s latest poll with pharmacy owners representing over 3,500 pharmacies in England conducted in October and November 2024 also shows 70% of pharmacy owners are “concerned that patient safety might be affected this winter”.
CPE chief executive Janet Morrison said community pharmacy “simply will not withstand another season of winter pressures” and its impact will be “unthinkable” on businesses, staff, patients, and the NHS if its left to collapse.
Read more: Streeting and Kinnock say it will be a ‘New Year’ start for pharmacy contract negotiations
“Years of underfunding, with cuts of 30% in real terms, have left community pharmacies battling for survival.
“They will continue to do everything they can to stay open and serve their patients … but pharmacies now need urgent support,” she said.
Over 80% of pharmacy owners expect longer waiting times this winter, with over a third expecting reduced opening hours and 73% expecting reduced availability of some services.
“All that is left is bone”
The recent polling by CPE comes as pharmacist MP Sadik Al-Hassan spoke in Parliament this week (December 17) and shared he is “eager to see this government avoid the mistakes made during the past 14 years that have brought our sector to a crisis point”.
The Labour MP and vice chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Pharmacy Al-Hassan was speaking at in a parliamentary debate calling for government investment and support for community pharmacies, with it focused on the Devon and the South West region as 20 MPs took part.
Al-Hassan said the “worst thing the previous government did for our industry was freeze the funding settlement for 10 years, resulting in a 40% reduction in real terms” and “we must stabilise the sector today with a fair funding settlement”.
Read more: CPE ‘united in anger’ as pharmacy contract negotiations ‘stuck’
He said the Conservatives prescribed pharmacy a “tough pill to swallow, and it’s going to take years to undo the side effects” as the challenges and neglect he saw working as a pharmacist “prompted me to run for parliament earlier this year”.
Al-Hassan bemoaned the previous government had negotiated a “bad Brexit deal”, cut off the “supply of pharmacist coming from Europe”, and not sorting out supply chain issues resulting in medicine shortages that has brought community pharmacy to its knees.
“Pharmacy has cut every ounce of fat that can be cut. All that is left is bone. This is a sector that has no more efficiencies to make,” he said.
Read more: Pharmacy contract limbo: Have negotiations finally resumed?
He called on the government to “expand pharmacies capacity” as the “obvious priority” to do this is through expanding Pharmacy First to “relieve pressure on GPs”.
He said this “can only be done by finally implementing the hub-and-spoke legislation, which was inexplicably shelved in September without warning or explanation”.
“The hub-and spoke model would allow smaller, independent community pharmacies to finally take advantage of the technologies larger chains have been utilising for decades, greatly increasing their efficiency and freeing up time previously spent on dispensing towards delivering clinical services to patients under an expanded Pharmacy First scheme.”
Al-Hassan added “we have a once in a generation opportunity to rewrite the story of pharmacy”.
Pharmacy leader concerns
In CPE’s latest poll, it shared data collected from 55 senior local pharmacy leaders in November 2024 that 97% of them were “concerned” or “extremely concerned” about the “ability of pharmacies in their area to continue serving patients this winter”.
69% of local pharmacy leaders believe there will be a “serious negative impact” on patients in their area, with the remainder expecting a “negative impact”.
Read more: NPA, IPA, CCA and CPE join forces to warn of ‘perilous’ budget
It also found that without an immediate funding uplift:
- 67% expect to see pharmacies reducing their opening hours in their area this winter.
- 60% expect to see more permanent closures of pharmacies in their area this winter.
- 58% expect longer waits for patients in their area this winter.
- 36% anticipate a reduction in the pharmacy services that are available in their area this winter.
An east England community pharmacy owner Anil Sharma said the sector is “really feeling the strain” and his team are “burnt out, stressed, and worried about how we’ll cope with ever increasing demand”.
“Patients rely on us, yet every day the service we are able to offer is deteriorating, whether its medicines we are unable to source, or waiting times because the team are so overloaded.
“We need urgent support to be able to keep helping our patients in the way that we want to,” he said.
Read more: Local services cut by 96% of pharmacies facing funding crunch, CPE reveals
It comes as pharmacy minister Stephen Kinnock also confirmed at the parliamentary debate on December 17 that contract negotiations would start “early in the new year” and “the reason for the delay is that the negotiation did not get over the line before the general election”.
And Wes Streeting, at a Health and Social Care (HSC) Committee public evidence session on the government’s 10 Year Health Plan yesterday (December 19), said his “number one focus” for community pharmacy is “stabilising the system”.
He also revealed “I definitely see, as does Stephen Kinnock, a bigger role for community pharmacy as part of the shift from hospital to community”.
