Our response to NHS reforms package

Health and Social Care Secretary Wes Streeting has today outlined new measures to improve NHS performance as part of a package of NHS reforms.

One aspect of the reforms is:

High-performing providers will be given greater freedom over funding and flexibility. There is little incentive across the system to run budget surpluses as providers cannot benefit from it. The reforms today will reward top-performing providers and give them more capital and greater control over where to invest it in modernising their buildings, equipment and technology.

Community Pharmacy England Chief Executive, Janet Morrison, said:

“It has been interesting to hear the Secretary of State pledge financial rewards for high performing health trusts today. This promise must apply to community pharmacy too – no other part of the NHS can match pharmacies when it comes to high performance. Community pharmacies are delivering more than 69 million unfunded health consultations per year; they have introduced a brand new Pharmacy First Service; they dispense 1.1 billion prescription items a year; and since 2017 they have managed a 350% increase in service demand… all while grappling with a real terms funding cut of over 30%. In efficiency terms, community pharmacy is in a league of its own.

We very much welcome the new Government’s vision to shift the NHS from sickness to prevention, and care from hospitals into communities, but time is running out if they want community pharmacies to play their full part in this. Pharmacy businesses are continuing to fall over, with many more on the brink of collapse: they need urgent help.

We have shown time and again that investment in the community pharmacy sector leads to improved health outcomes, and reduced pressures and costs elsewhere in the health service. Community pharmacy is a dynamic, innovative, patient-focused sector, whose accessibility and efficiency is unrivalled across the health service: the sector can lead the way in the reformed health service that the Secretary of State wants to see, but only if it is put on a sustainable footing.”