The Competition Authority has dismissed as "nonsensical" warnings by pharmacists that deregulation of the sector is threatening the viability of up to 400 chemists in disadvantaged areas.
There was "not a shred of evidence" that market liberalisation was forcing chemists to the wall, said Competition Authority member Mr Declan Purcell. He was responding to claims by the Irish Pharmaceutical Union that an inevitable consequence of deregulation last year would be a glut of chemists in better-off areas with a consequent decline in services in marginalised regions.
To advocate a return to the strict regulatory regime that existed before January 2002 was to argue for "pure protectionism", said Mr Purcell.
The IPU earlier accused the Government of presiding over a regulatory void, which had left community chemists at the mercy of ruthless market forces. Without swift remedial action, many of these pharmacies could go out of business, president Mr Richard Collis warned an IPU seminar on the future of the sector, in Dublin yesterday.
He said: "Uniquely in Europe, the Irish pharmacy market has been left unregulated by our Government. This is threatening the survival of small independent pharmacies in marginalised and rural areas in particular and the Government needs to act quickly to ensure that services in these areas are maintained."
Mr Collis accused the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, of "prevaricating" on the issue, having failed to respond to the recommendations of the Mortell group, which presented its report on reform of the sector to the Government more than a year ago.
The review, which has not been formally published, urged the removal of the prohibition on ownership of pharmacies by chemists trained outside the State and recommended that limits be set on the number of pharmacies a company can own within individual health board areas. "We are no closer to establishing a framework for the future of the profession than we were the night the old regulations were abolished," said Mr Collis.
The Department of Health shrugged off IPU accusations of heel-dragging, insisting the question of market reform was complex and should not be rushed. The Mortell report would be brought to Cabinet "as soon as possible" and published shortly afterwards, said a spokeswoman.
At the IPU seminar, Dr Tom O'Dowd, professor of general practice at Trinity College, Dublin, warned of the "McDonaldisation" of the industry: "In the case of GPs, experience has shown that people in better- off communities enjoy substantially easier access to GP services than in the case of marginalised communities. Policy-makers need to be careful to prevent similar disparities in service arising in an unregulated pharmacy sector."
Economist Mr Joe Durkan said private patients were cross-subsidising an uneconomic GMS scheme in pharmacies. "From a pharmacy perspective, the GMS scheme is uneconomic and without the support which pharmacies receive from private patients, it could not continue."
Under current law, anyone may operate a pharmacy once a registered pharmacist is on duty at all times. The pharmacist must have trained in the Republic or worked here for three years.
