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Letters to the Editor
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Overseas pharmacists
Society moving further away from my needs
From Mr M. Anisfeld, MRPharmS
In a recent edition of the PJ (25 February, p234), Philip
Green, deputy
secretary and registrar, Royal Pharmaceutical Society, explained that
the difference in non-practising fees for UK and overseas pharmacists
is solely due to the cost of airmailing the PJ.
I have worked in the US for 30 years in the pharmaceutical industry and
find the PJ of little use to me. Since I can read the PJ on the internet,
I have no need to receive the print copy. So why am I not being offered
the choice, as I used to be, of paying a supplement for airmailing the
PJ, or paying the UK non-practising membership fee without receiving
the PJ?
As the Society moves further and further away from meeting any of my
needs, the value of retaining membership recedes ever more rapidly. My
membership of the International Pharmaceutical Federation, the Organisation
for Professionals in Regulatory Affairs (TOPRA), the British Parenteral
Society and other professional organisations, means that I can attend
jointly sponsored Society meetings (nominally organised by Society’s
Industrial Pharmacists Group) at the same reduced rates as Society members.
If I ever need to use the services of the Society’s excellent library,
payment of the daily user fee means that I will financially be ahead
of the game if I cease being a member of the Society. I would have to
use the library for 21 days to equal the overseas retention fee (something
that is highly unlikely).
Membership due to nostalgia is one thing, but discriminatory fees that
provide no practical value are another.
Michael Anisfeld
Globepharm Consulting
Deerfield, Illinois
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The
Pharmaceutical Journal