§ Mr. Allan StewartTo ask the Secretary of State for Scotland when his Department will issue guidance to health boards on the sale of needles and syringes by pharmacists in Scotland.
§ Mr. Michael ForsythA circular is being issued today, and a copy has been placed in the Library of the House.
The circular asks health boards to promote local discussions to establish the need for the sale of injecting equipment to drug misusers in their area, and the number of pharmacists, who would participate on an entirely voluntary basis, willing to sell equipment to meet that need. This move is in recognition of the particularly significant problem of HIV infection in drug misusers which we face in Scotland. Of those who have been tested for HIV infection and found to be positive, over 50 per cent. are injecting drug misusers. HIV infection can be transmitted from one injecting drug misuser to another through the sharing of needles and syringes.
The circular is concerned with facilitating sales as a normal commercial transaction between pharmacists and their customers. Boards are, however, being asked to provide pharmacists with information about local support services. They are also being asked to ensure that adequate facilities are available for the disposal of used equipment so that the risk of its reuse by other drug misusers, and hence the transmission of infection, and the risk to the general public, in particular to children, from used equipment which has been carelessly or recklessly discarded, are minimised. The circular indicates that pharmacists should be encouraged to provide disposal facilities but that it should not be a condition of sale that used equipment is first returned. Boards are also asked to consider whether there is a need for disposal facilities in places frequented by drug misusers such as certain health board clinics.
The circular provides guidance on the procedures and conditions for the sale of equipment. These include restricting the number of needles and syringes which may be sold to each customer to five per visit. It also specifies that sales should be accompanied by the provision of advice and appropriate health education material.
506WAs regards the legal position, while no general unqualified assurance of immunity from prosecution will be given, my noble and learned Friend the Lord Advocate has said that he would not authorise the prosecution of any pharmacist in respect of sales by him of needles and syringes to drug misusers, provided the pharmacist has acted in accordance with the conditions and procedures set out in the circular.