Next year’s Scottish government has been urged to accelerate electronic prescribing and fund improved sustainable medication disposal in a new health and climate manifesto.
Health leadership bodies across Scotland – led by the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) and Royal College of GPs (RCGP Scotland) – launched their manifesto for health and climate on 19 December, ahead of next year’s Scottish Parliament election in May.
It focuses on creating a national movement for sustainable prescribing across Scotland’s healthcare system to support the NHS’s ambition to become net zero by 2040.
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The next Scottish government should ‘urgently allocate funds and accelerate electronic prescribing’ to reduce the burden of paper administration on GPs, pharmacists and other primary care clinicians, the manifesto said.
It called for ‘specific funding to primary care to improve sustainable medication disposal’ – specifically for research into the reuse of medicines not taken.
Medicines currently account for around 25% of carbon emissions in the NHS.
The manifesto also suggested that pharmaceutical companies make information about the environmental impact of medicines ‘readily available’. The Scottish government should work with the UK government to ‘compel’ the pharmaceutical industry to do this.
Other recommendations included a public messaging campaign about the benefits of green prescribing and making sustainability a part of education for healthcare professionals.
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The full manifesto can be read here.
RPS director for Scotland, Laura Wilson, said: ‘As medicines experts, pharmacists have unique insight into how medicines can be used more sustainably and safely which would not only reduce impact on the environment but also provide better outcomes for patients.
‘It is vital that the next Scottish Government works with health professional leadership bodies and Royal Colleges to tackle medicines waste, enable green social prescribing initiatives and increase the amount of information available to allow more sustainable prescribing decisions to be made.’
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The manifesto is endorsed by the British Dental Association in Scotland, Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, Royal College of Anaesthetists, Faculty of Public Health and The Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.
Last year, the Department of Health (DoH) in Northern Ireland asked pharmacists to inform a new consultation on the sustainable and cost-effective use of medicines
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