Pharmacy professionals are now “not exempt from the requirement to be licensed” to perform tattooing, body piercing, electrolysis and acupuncture in Wales, according to legislation that came into force last week (November 29).
The 2017 Public Health (Wales) Act had listed pharmacy professionals as exempt from rules that “an individual who performs a special procedure on someone else in the course of a business” in Wales “must do so under the authority of a special procedure licence”.
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But according to new legislation, pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and student pharmacists must now be licensed.
Dentists, midwives, nurses, optometrists and “unlicensed medical practitioners” are among the other professionals from whom the exemptions have been stripped.
Naloxone exemptions
It comes as further exemptions allowing pharmacists and pharmacy technicians to supply take-home naloxone without normal prescription-only medicines (POM) restrictions have today (December 2) come into force.
“Prior to these regulations, under the exemption that was just for drug treatment services, the permitted purpose for supply was limited to the actual saving of life in an emergency,” the legalisation said.
Read more: Pharmacies set to supply take-home naloxone without a prescription
“But under the new arrangements, suppliers will be able to supply ‘take-home’ naloxone products,” it added.
The new legislation said that the previous naloxone rules now “do not apply” to pharmacists and registered pharmacy technicians in England, Wales or Scotland.
However, they must have “undergone appropriate training in the storage and supply of naloxone products”, it added.
Read more: Will expanding access to naloxone OTC be the right move?
Last October, Scotland launched a nationwide pharmacy naloxone service meaning all Scottish pharmacies now hold “at least” two naloxone kits.
And last August, staff at Sheffield’s Wicker Pharmacy prevented two overdose deaths just a week after receiving naloxone training.
