Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the impact of the closure of pharmacy practices on health inequalities in (a) South East London, (b) London and (c) England.

The Department closely monitors the market to ensure people in England have good access to National Health Service pharmaceutical services. Despite the increase in pharmacy closures seen in recent years, there remains a similar number of pharmacies to ten years ago. 80% of the population live within 20 minutes’ walking distance of a pharmacy. There are relatively more pharmacies in areas of higher deprivation than in areas with lower levels of deprivation within South East London, London and England according to the latest (December 2022) data.