A MANIFESTO FOR COMMUNITY PHARMACY

That this House notes that GP services are being overloaded across the country with many patients unable to get appointments with a doctor for many days and sometimes weeks; further notes that A&E departments are also being overloaded, as patients increasingly resort to A&E departments to get basic medical treatment; further notes that qualified pharmacists have to undertake a four-year course of study to qualify and are qualified to treat and prescribe drugs for more minor ailments; believes that there is no substitute for the proper funding of the National Health Service in order to provide the health service the public expects and deserves; nonetheless further believes that pharmacists could play a much larger role in the direct treatment of minor ailments and thereby alleviate pressure on GP and A&E services; and therefore calls on the Government to undertaken an urgent study of A Manifesto for Community Pharmacy, a manifestso put together by pharmacists across the country, with a view to implementing their recommendations and demands as a matter of urgency.