'Prescription fees are hammering working people who can't afford vital medicine'

16 February 2023 , 22:15

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Pharmacists have called on the Government to scrap prescription fees in England (Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Ask any politician how much a single prescription costs, and wait to hear them get it wrong.

But for millions of people the price of medicine is just as important as the price of bread and milk.

And at £9.35 per item, the sick and their families struggle to afford regular medication during a cost-of-living crisis.

Half of chemists in England experience customers asking which medicines they can do without because they can’t pay for everything the doctor ordered.

This week pharmacists called on the Government to scrap NHS prescription fees in England, calling them “an unfair tax on health which disadvantages working people on lower incomes”.

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Health Secretary Steve Barclay says the country cannot afford to scrap prescription fees - despite Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland doing so years ago (AFP via Getty Images)

Paul Routledge