Comments sought on medicines disposal
New procedures for tracking the movement of hazardous waste, including waste medicines, have been proposed by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
As part of its consultation, Defra is seeking views on whether all prescription-only
medicines, or only cytotoxic and cytostatic medicines, should be classified
as hazardous. It warns that if all POMs receive this label then they
would be subject to new hazardous waste regulations that might discourage
pharmacies from operating waste-medicines schemes.
Gul Root, principal pharmaceutical officer at the Department of Health,
told The Journal: “It is really important that both primary care
trust and NHS trust chief pharmacists are aware of this consultation
and that they respond.”
Comments are welcome until 29 October. The consultation, which applies
to England, can be accessed here.
The part that deals specifically with medicines waste is paragraph 3.5. |
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