§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services how much money is spent by his Department on providing doctors with impartial information about medicines; what restrictions his Department places on the amount drug companies can spend on promoting drugs to general practitioners; and if he will express the amount allowed in terms of the amount per general practitioner.
§ Mr. NewtonIn the financial year 1985–86 almost £2 million was spent by the Department on providing impartial information about drugs to professional staff working in the National Health Service. This expenditure is not broken down by professional group. It excludes the cost of advice given by the Committee on Safety of Medicines to doctors and also the arrangements under the Medicines Act for regulating the prescribing information to doctors by pharmaceutical companies. In addition, 207W health authorities provide their own drug information services. It is not possible to separate the cost of such services from the total pharmaceutical services provided by health authorities.
Restrictions on drug promotion costs are not related to promotion to general practitioners only. They relate to all drugs provided to the NHS for prescriptions by doctors and dentists, whether in hospital or in general practice. The formula used has a differential effect for different companies but the overall limitation is 9 per cent. of the total NHS drugs bill in any year.