NEWS IN BRIEF: Budget Cuts; Investigating Committee; Steam Burns; Baby Boomers

Pharmacy Voice respond to 6% budget slash

 Rob Darracott, chief executive of Pharmacy Voice, has responded to an open letter from Government, at a meeting with pharmacy minister Alistair Burt: “Announcing a 6% funding cut to community pharmacy from next October over six months is certain to hurt the sector.

“Many contractors, currently in the midst of the Christmas rush, will be rightly anxious as to how this £170m cut will affect their patients, their businesses, their livelihoods and those of their pharmacy teams and other employees…

“As recognised in the letter, we think it is a constructive step that, for the first time, Pharmacy Voice and other organisations will have the opportunity to engage in this process as statutory consultees.

“We will work with colleagues across the community pharmacy sector to ensure that the value of the network is retained and that negative, unintended consequences are avoided.”

Breaking...https://t.co/vpf92Zussi Response soon

Related Article: Updated NHS App to help patients manage prescriptions

— Pharmacy Voice (@PharmacyVoice) December 17, 2015

https://t.co/kpjVsKdbj6 hopefully community pharmacy will see some of this in 2016 @MaeveMcLaughli1 @FearghalSDLP #shiftleft to primary care

— Bradleyspharmacy (@BradleysPharm) December 18, 2015

Guidance on pharmacy investigating committee launched

New guidance laying out the role and scope of the investigating committee that overseas allegations against pharmacists has been launched by the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC).

Good decision making: investigating committee meetings and outcomes guidance also explains who sits on the independent investigating committee and the outcomes which the committee can decide on.

These outcomes can include issuing a warning, agreeing undertakings with the registrant or referring a registrant to the fitness to practise committee.

Parents warned against steam treatment for colds

Children with coughs and colds should not be told to inhale steam over a bowl of hot water, doctors and nurses were warned following several serious burns cases, The Times has reported.

Related Article: Pharmacy First proves popular with public but supply issues cause concern

Surgeons at the Welsh Centre for Burns and Plastic Surgery, in Swansea, said that they were concerned about the number of children they were treating for steam-related injuries.

hospital warns of #burns risk of common cold remedy: https://t.co/5AtbeujVtH

— BAPRASvoice (@BAPRASvoice) December 18, 2015

Baby boomers more likely to binge drink

Affluent baby-boomers are most likely to drink too much, The Times has reported.

Official figures from the Health Survey for England show more than a quarter of Britain’s richest residents drink more than the safe limits.

The middle-aged were most likely to drink more than was good for them, although daily drinking became more common with age, reaching a peak of 28% of over-85s.

Related Article: Community pharmacies can provide HPV vaccination from 2026

Do you drink booze on a daily basis? https://t.co/m82b3tHPfZ

— Bubalu Bristol (@bubalubristol) December 17, 2015