Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans he has to (a) ensure the safety of and (b) support pharmacists during the covid-19 outbreak.

Community pharmacies are private businesses and employers in the sector have a legal responsibility to protect workers from risk to their health and safety. Guidance on working safely is available to community pharmacies. This includes guidance published on GOV.UK for people who work in or run shops, stores or similar environments, including community pharmacies, and a COVID-19 standard operating procedure for community pharmacy, which has been published by NHS England and NHS Improvement.

As part of minimising the risk to pharmacy staff, deliveries of personal protective equipment have been made to around 11,500 pharmacies in England. Further supplies have been distributed to wholesalers and distributor networks supplying community pharmacies and, where there remains an urgent need, provisions are in place for pharmacies to source supplies via Local Resilience Forums or the National Supply Distribution Response.

Funding of £300 has been provided to community pharmacies for the purchase and installation of physical barriers such as screens and retractable tape barriers, or other adjustments, to help enforce social distancing between their staff and patients.

We continue to work with the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee to assess what further support community pharmacy may require to continue to supply medicines and to help their communities stay well and to ensure their continued safety at this time.