Internet pharmacy loophole needs to be closed
From Mr T. Hall, MRPharmS
Over the past two years, two internet pharmacies have opened in my area.
I wonder how these applications are allowed to be approved, when they are blatantly not internet-only pharmacies or even mail-order-only pharmacies.
They are, in fact, prescription collection and delivery services. Nothing is processed via the internet.
The prescriptions are not posted through the mail. It is simply a telephone-ordered collection and delivery process.
When is this loophole going to be closed?
It is clearly not what was intended when the new regulations were formulated so why should it be allowed to continue?
Tony Hall
Warrington, Cheshire
Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee responds
From Stephen Lutener, head of regulation, Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee
The PSNC shares the concern of Mr Hall and it has been pressing the Department of Health since September 2006, when we responded to the consultation, on the impact of the exemptions.
We called for a review because the exemption for distance selling pharmacies is not being used as intended (ie, solely to provide an internet or mail order service) but to provide a service principally for the local population.
The PSNC has again made the point in its recent response to the Government’s consultation “Pharmacy in England: building on strengths — delivering the future” that the distance selling exemption is being misused and requests that the exemption be available only where the business is conducted wholly by mail order, by internet or both, rather than allowing the establishment of pharmacies that conduct its businesses on a local basis.
As the consultation expressly seeks views on the exemption for distance selling pharmacies, we hope that the Government will now address these concerns.