Group items tagged

The price concession for Atorvastatin 80mg has been increased to £3.91 from the previously set £3.45 for prescriptions dispensed in July, the Community Pharmacy England has said. The Department of Health and Social Care additionally introduced a concession price of £3.38 for Atorvastatin 20mg. "In July, our Dispensing and Supply Team experienced an unusually high influx of reports from pharmacies struggling to acquire Atorvastatin 80mg tablets at the listed Drug Tariff price," said CPE. CPE requested a price concession early in the month. However, after extended discussions, an agreement on the price wasn't reached. Consequently, on July 31st, the DHSC imposed a concession of £3.45. Addressing enduring pharmacy concerns over the pricing, CPE intensified advocacy with DHSC. This endeavour resulted in the revision of the Atorvastatin 80mg tablet concession price to £3.91 for prescriptions submitted and dispensed in July. According to CPE, this adjusted price sufficiently covers costs as reported by the majority of pharmacy owners. However, DHSC has refrained from modifying concessionary prices for the other two requested lines by CPE. DHSC communicated that their team's data collection for July, employing real-time sales and volume data, was incongruent with the adjustment of these prices, CPE further said.

The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC) has challenged price concessions imposed by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) on some of the medicines. It has raised concerns on the process for setting price concessions to senior government officials responsible for medicines supply, warning that the system is not working in the current environment from a community pharmacy contractor perspective. "When a new government takes over next week, this will be one of several urgent topics being raised by PSNC to new ministers, alongside the fuel price crisis, inflationary pressures and winter pressures on pharmacy businesses," said PSNC. The final update to August price concessions was announced yesterday taking the total concessions granted to a record 138 for August. PSNC said: "Of those, 99 were in line with PSNC requests, but prices for 39 lines were imposed by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC): those impositions do not match the purchase prices reported by contractors and the evidence of market prices which we passed on to DHSC. In particular, the final imposed prices of Apriprazole and Temazepam tablets has generated a lot of concern amongst contractors due to the large variation between their reimbursement prices and purchase prices during the month of August."

Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has implemented a process to roll over certain concessionary prices to the following month. From May 2023, the roll over process will apply to any products where agreement is reached on the final prices granted by DHSC for any price concession requests submitted late in the month (on or after the 23rd of the month) by Community Pharmacy England. Community Pharmacy England said: "As part of the Year 4 & 5 funding settlement for community pharmacy, it was agreed that an urgent review of the price concession setting system would take place." It has been working with DHSC to determine improvements to the price concession system. Community Pharmacy England said: "Pharmacy owners (members) will be able to see the lines that have rolled over on our price concessions page here. Please note any rolled over prices can be adjusted upwards if we receive reports from our members to indicate suppliers' selling prices have increased. The review can be requested at any point during the month."

Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has updated the final price concessions for June 2023, following a discussion by Community Pharmacy England regarding medicine pricing issues reported by pharmacy owners (its members). A price concession only applies for the month it is granted; any prices agreed for concessions requested late in the month will roll over into the following month. Community Pharmacy England encouraged pharmacies to report any problems obtaining a Part VIII product at or below the stated Drug Tariff price, using the online feedback form on the Community Pharmacy England website along with full details of the supplier and price paid for any products sourced above the Drug Tariff price. The association will investigate the extent of the problem and, if appropriate, discuss the issue with DHSC.

Any prescription for Promethazine hydrochloride 10mg tablets x 56 submitted for payment to the NHSBSA for July 2022 will be reimbursed at the new price of £17.77 not as per the price concession of £13.45 announced in the 4th concessions update published on 29 July 2022, said the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC). In July 2022, PSNC received several reports from contractors unable to obtain Promethazine hydrochloride 10mg tablets (56) at the published Drug Tariff price of £4.24. Therefore, it submitted a request for a price concession, which was granted and subsequently published but this was later withdrawn after confirmation from the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) that due to the price change mechanism, the reimbursement price for Promethazine hydrochloride 10mg tablets has increased from £4.24 to £17.77 for July 2022. PSNC said, "Following the price change mechanism rules, for generic drugs (excluding drugs in Category M), a price change up to and including the 8th of the month takes effect for prescriptions dispensed in that same month. Any price change after the 8th takes place in the following month."

The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee has announced that the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has granted the following price concessions for November 2021. Contractors can find information on the price concessions and learn about the process involved on PSNC's website. A price concession only applies for the month in which it is granted. No additional prescription endorsement are required as the new price is automatically applied by the NHSBSA to all items submitted for payment in the same month for which a price concession is granted. PSNC is still working with the DHSC to agree further concessionary prices on other drugs reported to be unavailable at the stated November 2021 Drug Tariff price.

The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC) has raised concerns over the impact that high medicine price rises are having on contractor. Recently, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has granted the final list of price concessions for December 2022. The latest additions bring the total number of concessionary prices granted for the month of December to 198, surpassing the previous record of 159 granted in September 2022. PSNC has heard from hundreds of community pharmacy contractors who are paying inflated prices for antibiotics used for the treatment of Strep A and who have rightly been concerned about the lack of certainty around the final reimbursement prices for these medicines. It added: "We welcomed the involvement of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to look into the pricing of antibiotics. But the number of reports we are getting from contractors about medicines price rises are just not acceptable and this goes far beyond the antibiotic crisis."

There has been a lot of coverage in the national and pharmaceutical press of the prices being charged to pharmacy owners for certain medicines. Leaving aside the reasons for steep price rises, I have been asked on social media and elsewhere whether pharmacy owners can refuse to supply prescribed medicines if they would make a significant financial loss. Legal obligation The first thing to point out is that the National Health Service Act 2006 imposes a legal duty on the Secretary of State and NHS England to make arrangements for people to receive sufficient prescribed drugs. These arrangements involve the publication of the Drug Tariff. The Drug Tariff includes reimbursement prices or a method for determining prices. Various factors can be taken into account in determining reimbursement prices. The Drug Tariff does not provide a pound for pound reimbursement for medicines that pharmacies supply on NHS prescriptions.

The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has redetermined the December 2023 concessionary prices for four medicines following requests made by Community Pharmacy England (CPE) on behalf of community pharmacy owners. For Ezetimibe 10mg tablets (pack size 28), the price has been fixed at £17.78, up from £9.44. Other drugs included in the list are Aripiprazole 5mg (£8.52), Digoxin 125microgram (£3.70) and Digoxin 250micrgram (£3.70) tablets. Contractors would be reimbursed at the new prices only for prescriptions submitted for payment for the dispensing month of December 2023. CPE said they are still working with DHSC to agree price concessions for January. Check the final the December 2023 price concessionary here. Additionally, DHSC on Friday confirmed that there's now sufficient stock of Clarithromycin 125mg/5ml oral suspension to meet normal demand, and the Serious Shortage Protocol (SSP), SSP053 for the antibiotic expires on 12 January 2024.

The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee has announced that the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has granted final price concessions to further items for the month of November 2021. A price concession only applies for the month in which it is granted. No additional prescription endorsement are required as the new price is automatically applied by the NHS BSA to all items submitted for payment in the same month for which a price concession is granted. Contractors can find information and learn about the process involved on PSNC's website. Check pharmacy business website for price concession list november 2021.

The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has revised concession prices for four products and confirmed three further price concessions for May 2024. This announcement comes in response to representations made by Community Pharmacy England (CPE) on behalf of community pharmacy owners Concession prices have been redetermined for Ezetimibe 10mg tablets, Quetiapine 100mg tablets, Quetiapine 150mg tablets and Quetiapine 200mg tablets. Here are the newly granted concessions: Nicorandil 10mg tablets (60 tablets): £5.05 Nicorandil 20mg tablets (60 tablets): £9.30 Pregabalin 75mg capsules (56 capsules): £1.54 The revised prices will be applicable to prescriptions submitted for payment during the dispensing month of May 2024, and do not apply to June 2024 prescriptions, the CPE noted.

The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee has announced that the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has granted further price concessions for the month of December 2021. A price concession only applies for the month in which it is granted. No additional prescription endorsement are required as the new price is automatically applied by the NHS BSA to all items submitted for payment in the same month for which a price concession is granted. Contractors can find information and learn about the process involved on PSNC's website.

The Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) has upheld the Competition and Markets Authority's (CMA) findings against two pharmaceutical manufacturers who consistently overcharged hydrocortisone tablets for over a decade. Auden/Actavis UK's pricing for the critical medicine 'hydrocortisone' from 2008 to 2018 constituted an abuse of their dominant market position, leading to fines nearing £130 million, CMA said in a statement. "These companies increased the price of this crucial medicine by over 10,000 per cent, soaring from 70p to £72 within that period. These are the highest ever CMA penalties upheld by the Tribunal," the CMA said. In July 2021, the CMA imposed fines exceeding £265 million on hydrocortisone manufacturers Auden Mckenzie and Actavis UK, which acquired Auden's business in 2015 and subsequently became Accord-UK. The fines were imposed for abuse of dominance and collusion by both the parent companies and potential competitors. The recent verdict, announced on September 18, comes five weeks after the Tribunal supported the CMA's decision in a separate case regarding the pricing of medicines supplied to the NHS. In that prior case, fines amounted to £84 million.

Britain's competition watchdog has fined pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Flynn £63 million and £6.7 million respectively for allegedly breaking competition law and illegally profiting from the sale of an anti-epilepsy drug. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) found that the two companies colluded to sell phenytoin sodium capsules, previously known as Epanutin, at "unfairly high prices" for over four over years between 2012 and 2016. The annual costs of the capsules for the NHS increased from £2 million in 2012 to approximately £50 million the following year. CMA has accused Pfizer of charging, over four years, prices between 780 per cent and 1,600 per cent higher than what was fixed previously for the medicine used to prevent life-threatening epileptic seizures. Pfizer supplied the drug to Flynn, which then sold the capsules on to wholesalers and pharmacies at a price between 2,300 per cent and 2,600 per cent higher than the prices previously charged by Pfizer.

The Department of Health and Social Care have retrospectively granted a concessionary price for Isocarboxazid 10mg tablets for the months of May and June 2021. While the reimbursement price had previously been £217.75, a concessionary price of £249.10 has now been granted. The NHS Business Services Authority confirmed that payment for the difference - £31.35 for every pack of 56 claimed - will be adjusted accordingly for the mentionedtime period where contractors have submitted claims in those months. This adjustment will be paid on 31 December 2021 in the next Schedule of Payments.

The Community Pharmacy England has raised a concern on pricing and availability of Atorvastatin tablets. CPE is In discussions with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and have warned about the serious impact this issue is now having on pharmacies. The issue was highlighted after a number of pharmacy owners have got in touch with CPE about the pricing and availability of Atorvastatin tablets. The association said: "The DHSC Supply Team has been working closely with manufacturers and wholesalers on this issue. Thank you to those of you who have taken the time to report the increased prices that you have purchased at.

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) has published the Drug Tariff Category M price list for July which reflects an increase in reimbursement level of approximately £5m per quarter. An adjustment of -£23.8m was announced, in light of the results of the margin survey (latest result up until end of December 2022), and the phasing down of the additional £100m agreed across years 4 and 5 as part of the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework and uplifts for underlying market prices (between January - March 2023). Community Pharmacy England has agreed the adjustments based on the analysis of margin delivery and on current projections for 2023/24. It said: "The objectives are to ensure full delivery of agreed margin and smooth delivery as much as possible. As always, the impact on individual pharmacies will vary depending on dispensing mix."

The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC) has expressed its concerns over sustained pressures on medicines supply that are having a very serious impact on community pharmacy teams and their patients. It has asked contractors and their teams to continue using its regular reporting tools to help them demonstrate the scale of the problems to the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and to support escalations as needed. The committee said: "The sustained increases in price concessions that we have seen so far in 2022 - with more than 100 concessions being granted in some months - show no signs of abating, and we know that many pharmacies now find themselves in a critical situation trying to source medicines in timely manner and facing significant financial risk due to greater uncertainty around expected reimbursement prices for a large number of medicines." "We know that some concessions being imposed by the Department do not match contractors' experience on the ground, and we would ask all contractors to continue reporting pricing issues to us on a regular basis to support our representations: Report product over Drug Tariff price."

The PSNC on Friday said it has warned the DHSC about the "very serious impact" of the limited supply of certain antibiotics on pharmacies who are "having to chase stock, purchase without sight of any concession prices, and cope with increasing patient questions and abuse." With higher than usual number of cases of scarlet fever, caused by invasive Group A Streptococci (iGAS) infections, being reported in children across the country, supplies of antibiotics for Group A Strep treatment have seen a surge in demand, leading to limited supply at certain wholesalers and pharmacies. PSNC has urged the DHSC to adopt measures that could help to manage the current crisis, such as allowing pharmacists more freedom to change strengths or formulations without prescriber approval, outside of Serious Shortage Protocols. It has also raised concerns on the significant rise in wholesale prices of many oral antibiotics as a result of the surge in demand and the ongoing supply disruptions. PSNC also said they have received reports of some suppliers putting up their prices for any oral antibiotics they do have in stock.

British pharmacies and slimming clinics are reducing prices for weight-loss drugs Wegovy and Mounjaro in a competitive bid to win patients. Both Novo Nordisk's Wegovy (semaglutide) and Eli Lilly's Mounjaro (Tirzepatide) injection drugs are cleared for weight loss in combination with a reduced-calorie diet and increased physical activity. Wegovy was launched in the UK market in September, with Mounjaro following in February. Initially designed for treating type 2 diabetes, the drugs have been found to also induce weight loss by suppressing appetite and decelerating digestion. As reported by Reuters, Simple Online Pharmacy has further reduced the price of starter doses of Mounjaro to £149 for a one-month supply. In February, the price was cut to £159 ($198) from £179. Additionally, the pharmacy on Monday discounted the higher Mounjaro strengths that patients take later.