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The Pharmacists' Defence Association (PDA) has urged pharmacists working in Covid-19 vaccination role to report any concerns about the needles and syringes supplied with the Moderna Spikevax Bivalent vaccine. The association has heard reports of bending when vaccinators pierce the top of the vial containing the Covid-19 vaccine doses, needles falling out during manipulation and appearing to be bent even before removal from the packaging. PDA has advised its members who are working in a Covid-19 vaccination role "to report any concerns via the Yellow Card medical device reporting system, and to keep up to date with NHS clinical updates for ongoing information and guidance." Current advice from the NHS includes sharing of video and poster resources (available on FutureNHS) which have been produced by the supplier to support the introduction of the new administration needles and syringes for Spikevax Bivalent. This is following a switch from BD Flu+ 23G x 25mm 1ml syringe combined needle and syringe (CNS) to the Owen Mumford Unifine Safety Retractable Needle 25G x 25mm & 1ml Syringe.

The Pharmaceutical Defence Association (PDA) has urged health ministers of the UK to take a strict and necessary action against the unnecessary closures of pharmacy. Concerned over the rising number of pharmacy closures, PDA has written an open letter to health secretary Steve Barclay; Robin Swann, health minister for Northern Ireland; Eluned Morgan, minister of health and social services for Wales; and Humza Yousaf, the Scottish health secretary. In its letter, PDA said: "The minister of health must now ensure the regulation of poor business behaviours and be prepared to take over rogue pharmacies, however large their corporate owner may be. If patients' access to NHS services is to be protected from the consequences of avoidable full or part-day pharmacy closures." The association believes it is only a matter of time before serious harm to patients' health will be caused by the decisions of mainly large chains of pharmacies to close some of their branches for all or part of a day, instead of engaging an available pharmacist to cover their agreed opening hours. "While a small number of unforeseen closures have always occurred from time to time in pharmacies for genuine reasons, the indiscriminate scale at which closures have now become commonplace seems to have evolved over the last 20 months."

Pharmacy leaders have called for reassurance that the workforce plan, expected by April 2023, will cover the entirety of the pharmacy workforce across the health service, including in community pharmacies. A joint letter has been signed by representatives from 14 pharmacy organisations which highlights that with continued pressures on services, it is more important than ever to support the pharmacy workforce so that the staff needed to deliver patient care now and into the future can be recruited, trained and retained. Mark Koziol, Pharmacists' Defence Association (PDA) Chairman said: "Our pharmacist members practise across the entire health system and have the potential to do far more to help patients and improve public health, but they can only do so safely if they are in appropriately staffed workplaces. This is a workforce issue, so it is important that the Government works with representatives of the pharmacist workforce, and of their employers, to get a suitably agreed plan in place." Thorrun Govind, English Pharmacy Board Chair, Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS), said: "It will be crucial to use the skills of all our health professions to support the NHS recovery, reduce health inequalities, manage the growing cost of long-term conditions, and deliver best value from medicines.

The PDA has raised concerns over the 'deliberate breaches' of the NHS contract by some community pharmacy businesses, saying that it may cause harm to patients and damage the reputation of the profession. The organisation said concerned pharmacists have revealed to them that some businesses are now explicitly saying that if locums will not agree to work for less than a so-called 'maximum' hourly rate, the business will close the pharmacy for either part of, or the whole day. Some of these full or part-day closures are being communicated significantly in advance of the actual day, it added. The union further alleged that several pharmacy businesses seem to have simultaneously implemented identical so-called 'maximum rates' in what could be an anti-competitive behaviour.

The Pharmacists' Defence Association (PDA) has expressed disappointment at the omission, once again, of the promised Employment Rights Bill omitted from the Queen's Speech earlier this week. The Bill is pledged to strengthen day one employment rights and increase the productivity of businesses. It set out plans which would protect and enhance workers' rights and aim to make the UK the best place in the world to work at. This included plans to introduce the right to request flexible working for around 2.2 million people in Great Britain - regardless of time served in a bid to modernise the way employees work. The PDA said: "The Employment Rights Bill would have presented an opportunity to improve the ability for workers to obtain redress in the event of poor treatment or discrimination through the development of a single labour market enforcement body. "Poor employment practices, such as insecure work through long-term zero-hours contracts, unilaterally changing workers' terms and conditions by terminating their contracts and re-hiring them on new terms and conditions (also known as fire and rehire), and the sacking of workers without notice, as recently demonstrated by P & O Ferries, could have been outlawed under new legislation."

The Pharmacists' Defence Association raised concerns over the practice of firing and rehiring employees, which often leads to denial of individuals' rights to redundancy, forcing them to face cuts to their terms and conditions. It noted that some employers may use the 'fire and rehire' practice to force staff to accept lower wages, different hours, or other changes in working conditions. It cited an example of a lawsuit in which Tesco lost a High Court battle when Usdaw won a case to protect workers from unfair tactics. The PDA said although the trade union won the case, the practice of firing and rehiring can still be legal in some circumstances. However, it believes the practice is both immoral and unethical.

The Pharmacy Supervision Practice Group consisting of members from AIMp, APTUK, CCA, NPA, PDA, PFNI and RPS held its fourth workshop to continue discussions on the future modelling of pharmacy practice. The ideas around 'supervision' shared by the organisation earlier formed the basis of the discussion during the workshop and helped to expand understanding of where there was consensus and disagreement. Examples of ideas explored during the workshop include: the extent to which a pharmacist should supervise the medicines assembly process, the purpose and extent to which a pharmacist might be absent from the pharmacy and how this might affect patient safety as well as the nature of whether fixed rules versus a broad framework were preferable for future practice. Chair of the group, Dr Michael Twigg, Associate Professor of Primary Care Pharmacy, University of East Anglia, said "Once again the sector bodies have come together in a collaborative and positive manner to explore the concept of 'supervision' in the context of current and future community pharmacy practice. This session provided an opportunity to constructively challenge assumptions and viewpoints within the group with the aim of moving the discussion forward." As part of the session, the DHSC, GPhC and PSNI gave an overview of the difference between legislation, regulation and guidance which was helpful to inform the group's thinking. Each of the organisations have been asked to use the conversation to refine the ideas presented in advance of the next workshop.

"Discussions must involve the government on behalf of NHS Scotland, CPS on behalf of the owners, and the PDA as the pharmacists' representative," it said. The association believes that there is a need for discussion and decision-making that listens to and balances the rights and responsibilities of both employers and workers, to generate benefits for individuals, organisations, and society. It added: "Even though Scotland provides the most generous community pharmacy settlement in the UK, recent reports suggest it is not enough for pharmacy owners with CPS's rejection of the latest funding proposal in May. Though the Scottish government found an extra £20M to ease pressures related to medicines price increases, an overall agreement has still not been reached." "The UK-wide chains may be doing less well in the parts of their networks covered by the Westminster government's contract, but the taxpayers and government of Scotland need to be given reassurance that they are in no way subsidising funding shortfalls in England's pharmacy contract." Recently, when LloydsPharmacy's Scotland branches recently came on the market, they appear to have been sold exclusively to existing contractors, including the UK-wide multiple, Rowlands Pharmacy, who have acquired 30 of them. Other small and medium-sized Scottish pharmacy chains have apparently been able to double in size overnight by acquiring branches.

NHS England has launched a prescription savings campaign, particularly for those living with long-term conditions. The campaign is specifically for individuals residing in deprived areas as they receive more prescriptions than people in affluent areas. It is also known that people with low income could be entitled to help with costs or free prescriptions depending on their circumstances. The Pharmacists' Defence Association (PDA), an active member of the Prescription Charges Coalition, is actively striving to eliminate prescription charges in England as well. They are focussing on "NHS England's current efforts to minimise charges so that members practising in England can alert patients to this possibility".

Campaigners have submitted an open letter to the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), urging the Minister for Primary Care and Public Health to freeze prescription charges to keep people with long-term conditions alive and well. The campaign is led by the Prescription Charges Coalition, which represents over 50 organisations, including Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) and Pharmacists' Defence Association (PDA). Currently, the prescription charge is £9.65 per item, and campaigners have asked the government to freeze it for 2024 and 2025 as people living with long-term health conditions in England are "being forced to choose between heating, eating, and taking their vital medication on a daily basis." In 2023, a study conducted by the Prescription Charges Coalition revealed that almost 10 per cent of survey participants had skipped medication in the previous year due to the cost of prescriptions. This led to increased physical and mental health problems, as well as impacted the time they took off work. Laura Cockram, Chair of the Prescription Charges Coalition and Head of Campaigns at Parkinson's UK, expressed deep concern that a further rise in the charge this year will lead to people skipping or not taking the full dose of their medication, which will affect their health and put more pressure on the already under pressure NHS.