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The Society
Vote with your feet
From Mr R. S. Lee, MRPharmS
It has been most gratifying to read the growing number of letters appearing
in The Pharmaceutical Journal stating that their authors have decided
to resign from pharmacy. The young student’s accurate analysis
(PJ, 31 July, p151) of the futility of entering a so-called profession
that will provide him with neither the financial rewards or status of
a plumber, electrician, landscape gardener or chef, coupled with the
poignant contribution of the brilliant academic pharmacognosist E.
J. Shellard (PJ, 28 August, p285) indicate the extent to which pharmacy’s
governing body has become both an irrelevance and an irritant to many
of its present and potential members.
During the 41 years I have been on the register the Society has done
nothing to uphold my honour or improve my well being nor did it previously
contribute to my obtaining a pharmacy degree. That was due to the sacrifices
of poor working class parents. Its main contribution has been to preside
over the massive growth of commercial organisations that have or will
soon succeed in monopolising community pharmacy. The balance sheet, masquerading
under the banner of “customer care” and “improving
public health awareness” has directed pharmacy policies. The result
has been a rush to recruit overseas pharmacists from regions where remuneration
is even lower than in the UK and the unprecedented rise in the percentage
of part-time women pharmacists as demonstrated by the Society’s
recent census.
For decades the members’ true opinion of their Society has been
reflected in the pathetic voting returns in Council elections and the
latest referendum. Unperturbed the Society has sought salvation in the
growth of regulation, committees, directorates and extended administrative
roles: the false trappings of power. Humbly beseeching our sovereign
to allow it to change its Charter and excessive pride in the right to
be called Royal has failed to mask the increasing hostility of the governed
towards those who control but have contributed little to their everyday
lives, except to agree to the creation of evermore regulations and quasi
roles to justify pharmacy’s very existence.
By successfully urging my sons not to enter pharmacy I ensured their
careers have been extremely rewarding both materialistically and in terms
of job satisfaction. My good fortune has been in obtaining qualifications
in a completely different field to pharmacy.
I urge all those who have indicated their intention to resign their Society
membership to turn words into action. I certainly shall. Do not remain
the silent majority but vote with your feet. The recent leader (PJ, 28
August, p276) “Light at the end of the tunnel” is a mirage
comparable to the anecdotal evidence of those who claim to have had a
near death experience. We will then be able to join the public and demand
from the Society the “seamless care” denied to us as pharmacists.
R. S. Lee
Longstanton,
Cambridge
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The
Pharmaceutical Journal