'Our pharmacies are at a cliff edge': The government must come to the table and sort funding settlement

9 January 2025, 14:19

By Ashley Cohen

Pharmacies like mine up and down the country have been left fighting to survive after a decade of cuts.

They are vital to our health and our communities but are on their knees.

Pharmacies check and dispense millions of prescriptions every year. They give health advice and treatment to countless people for whom they are an essential source of health care, right on their doorsteps.

Like my colleagues up and down the country, I am immensely proud to be part of the NHS family and I rely on about 90-95% of my funding from my contract with the health service.

But I despair at a situation which has left pharmacies facing real terms cuts of 40% in the past decade and a broken funding formula which means the NHS does not even cover the cost of many medicines I supply.

I am struggling to serve my patients. Trying to get them medicines too often in short supply and often dispensing them at a loss.

But so many pharmacies  - more than 1,200 in the past 10 years – have found the situation too much to bear and have simply closed for good.

That means people in the areas they serve have to travel further to get medicines and advice. Hard-pressed local doctors and A&E departments have to fill the gap.

Today I am looking towards April when the introduction of National Insurance contributions and increases in the National Living Wage will leave me and pharmacies across the country with a cliff edge of extra costs.

At the same time, the government has not even sat down to talk about the funding settlement for the current financial year – something that should have been sorted out by the previous government a year ago or more.

The fact we are now into 2025 without the government sitting down with our negotiating body leaves me incredulous.

I look at my own financial situation along with other colleagues. I have had to go to the bank twice since January 2024 and had to borrow £125k to get us through this year.

There are only so many times you can inject money from savings accounts, borrow from the bank or cash in on pension pots to keep your business afloat.

Pharmacies do not want to take action in protest at cuts. They do not want to cut opening hours or services. We all went into the community pharmacy sector to serve our communities and help keep people healthy.

But we are being forced into a situation where we need to cut what we do in order to survive. It is better to have a pharmacy with reduced hours than no pharmacy at all.

The current government may not be to blame for the decade of underfunding, but they urgently need to step in now before it’s too late to give us the stability urgently required.

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Ashley Cohen is a pharmacy owner in Leeds and board member for the National Pharmacy Association.

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