Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he plans to take to tackle losses to community pharmacies arising from delays in price concessions and drug tariffs.

The Drug Tariff is updated monthly and sets out reimbursement prices to be paid to pharmacy contractors for medicines dispensed. When the market price of a generic medicine suddenly increases, concessionary prices can be granted in that month, increasing the reimbursement price above the Drug Tariff price, with the aim of mitigating pharmacy contractors dispensing at a loss. If the medicine margin survey indicates that, despite a concessionary price, there was a significant under payment for a specific product, there is a provision known as a retrospective top-up payment for concessionary prices, which provides an additional payment to contractors for those products. A quarterly medicine margin survey also ensures that pharmacy contractors are reimbursed enough overall for the medicines they dispense.