SMALL regional and country pharmacies say they face financial ruin when the Federal Government’s scheme to expand prescriptions from one month to two takes effect from September 1.
And Troy Davis’ Lake Boga pharmacy is one of them.
Pharmacists receive dispensing fees from the Commonwealth for each medication sold, which totalled $1.67 billion in the financial year 2021-22.
Under the proposed changes, that cost will be halved.
“That’s bad enough, that will impact on the viability of every pharmacy, but it is also only part of a bigger problem,” Mr Davis said.
“Since COVID the drug-supply chain has been in chaos and we are all still facing shortages in so many medicines, most of them the ones used on a regular basis.
“My pharmacy is not a big one, so we only get a limited supply of things such as antibiotics or blood-pressure medications and under this scheme they will now be going out the door twice as fast.
“If all my regulars come in on September 1 and walk out the door with two months’ supply, and a new patient comes in the next day with a new script, chances are I won’t be able to fill it be cause I won’t have any until my next allocation arrives.”
A frustrated Mr Davis took to his pharmacy’s Facebook page recently with a video detailing his concerns about the immediate future of his business.
He said he did not go into the pharmacy to make a fortune, he went into it because he loved being part of a community.
“If I was in this for the money, I would not be in Lake Boga,” Mr Davis said.
“I have been here almost four years and I have been made so welcome by everyone in the district and it is so rewarding,” he said.
“But as a one-person operation facing a massive cut in core revenue, I really worry I won’t be able to provide all the services and supports I currently do.
“For example, I have customers who go away for holidays and forget their medications, so they call me, I fax a copy of their prescriptions to a pharmacy near where they are and that solves the problem. Or people come in feeling unwell and I might give them a blood-pressure test or someone else might want a flu shot.
“We might now have to charge for all those to try and offset the money we just lost – and I don’t want to have to do that because that’s exactly what I never wanted to do.”
Mr Davis said he might also have to cut back opening hours and has just announced he will no longer be open on Saturdays.
The two-month plan is being heavily backed by the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, which says it rejects a “profit-over-patient model” and needs to “make sure people can have cheaper and easier health care and free up those GP appointments”.
A spokesman for the Federal Health Department said Canberra intended to reinvest every dollar saved as a result of the changes back into community pharmacies.
Mr Davis said anyone looking around north-west Victoria could see the potential fallout of the program.
“Take Ouyen, for example, there’s not another pharmacy within 100km there so imagine the problems that towns faces if its pharmacy goes.
“And even here, where Swan Hill is much closer, it is still a challenge for our more vulnerable residents, the older, the handicapped and those who simply don’t drive.”
