Patient concern over access to prescription drugs as pharmacies temporarily close
Boots and Brown & Francis pharmacies were open but not dispensing medicines, but NHS England and NHS Improvement said both were expected to be short-term problems, with both opening tomorrow (Thursday).
A spokesperson for NHSE&I said patients from Boots and Brown & Francis were being directed to Lloyds, which remained open for the day.
“Boots is open but not dispensing today because the pharmacist is sick; however, they have found a pharmacist for Thursday March 31.
“Brown & Francis was open but not distributing until 1pm today as the pharmacist was ill, however they secured supplies from the pharmacist from 1pm and they are now distributing.”
Matt Webster, head of retail at Peak Pharmacy, which has 120 pharmacies across England including Brown & Francis, said: “We’ve owned Ludlow Pharmacy for a year and this is the first time ours has and Boots are closed,” he said.
“This is a rare event and not a situation we would have liked.”
Mr Webster said if the situation was an emergency, staff had a way to get a prescription from another pharmacy.
“We are working hard to bring a pharmacist to Ludlow and hope to fix this as soon as possible.”
78-year-old Station Drive Surgery patient Mike Fothergill from Caynham said: “People are running out of life-saving drugs.
“Not only does it take a long time to go through the phone ordering service, but doctors take up to 10 days to sign prescriptions. Then, if the prescription can’t be taken to a pharmacy, what do we do? we ?” “
Mr Fothergill, a diabetic, added: ‘Somebody should provide a way to get medicine. There are certain medicines people have to take or it gets serious.’
On Tuesday, the Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin Integrated Care System (ICS) declared a ‘critical system incident’ covering the county’s two main acute care hospitals, care homes, doctors’ surgeries and ambulances.
Eight GP practices were operating business continuity plans due to staff illness and NHS111 and Shropdoc (the county’s out-of-hours GP service) reported staffing issues. Furloughed staff have been asked to contact work to see if they are needed.