From Dr A. Shallal, MRPharmS
SIR,—The creation of a new French pharmaceutical union (PJ, October 9, p559) merits a pause in our thinking.
The idea is raising the spectre of a wind of change coming to us from the continent. At a time when the government in France exerted sustained pressure onto the pharmacy profession with no adequate response from the traditional establishment towards its "radical reforms", pharmacists must have felt let down by those who supposedly represent them. Under such a pressure, new thinking must spring out.
The same could happen in the UK.
The manner in which our pharmaceutical profession has been treated (or rather mistreated) by consecutive governments surely creates the atmosphere. It is apparent that our Society and the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee have been ineffective in defending our profession, or presenting it as a valuable health profession, to say the least.
In such an atmosphere of low morale and in a situation where pharmacists spend more and more of their time checking the prices of generics and where to find them, rather than investing time in counselling and advising patients, a new wave of thinking is inevitable.
When it comes to evaluating the effectiveness of those who have been representing my interest as a pharmacist I will think twice in the future. I will ask myself the following questions: Have they truly been defending the profession or not? Have they been able in projecting the invaluable services that we offer the public every day or not? Do they really represent us?
Sir, is it not demoralising to listen to the President of the Society proclaiming that the profession is "raring to go" when the Minister for Health has no news of his strategy document (PJ, October 9, p565)? I wonder where the profession and its strategy for the future are going? I wonder how long before a new British Pharmaceutical Union will be created?
Asaad Shallal
London NW9