§ Dr. Evan HarrisTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment he has made of the benefits of the movement of products from prescription control to pharmacy sale; and what impact the change would have on access to treatments. [36295]
§ Ms BlearsWe are committed to empowering patients to make informed health care choices. Widening access to medicines, including moving medicines from prescription only status to availability from a pharmacist where is it safe to do so, can play an important part in this process.
The benefits of making more medicines available from the pharmacy include the opportunity for people to access treatments speedily, at a time and a place of their choosing that would otherwise only be available having consulted a prescriber.
The NHS Plan set out a range of proposals for improving access to medicines including developing the role of pharmacists set out in "Pharmacy in the Future"—a copy of which is in the Library. It outlines a range of changes designed to enable the greater availability of medicines, including independent nurse prescribing, supplementary prescribing and patient group directions. Taken together, these initiatives will have an important impact on improving access to treatments and ensuring our commitment to patient centred care is taken forward.
Reclassification of medicines can also play an important role in supporting our clinical priority areas, for example in disease prevention and health promotion. It also provides support on more specific health initiatives such as smoking cessation where, a number of nicotine replacement products were made more widely available in May 2001.