Coles resigns as BAPW chairman; Brownlee elected
Ian Brownlee: the BAPW’s new chairman |
It is only full-line wholesalers that are able safely to sort and deliver over two billion individual items each year with astonishingly short lead times, rapidity and punctuality of supply, said Ian Browlee, the British Association of Pharmaceutical Wholesalers'; new chairman, at a BAPW reception at the Palace of Westminster, London, this week.
His comments, when introducing health minister Andy Burnham, are in the
wake of UniChem managing director David Coles’s resignation from
his role as chairman a fortnight ago over the “commercial conflict
of interest” that Pfizer and UniChem’s distribution deal
posed.
Mr Brownlee, of Mawdsley-Brooks, went on to criticise Pfizer for putting
profit before pharmacy and patients, saying that the current system works
well, and ensures access to a comprehensive and complete range of pharmaceutical
products. “What we do works so well that it’s taken for granted,” he
remarked.
The BAPW used the occasion to launch its “Gold standard of good
distribution practice by pharmaceutical wholesalers”.
The document, endorsed by the Med-icines and Healthcare products Regulatory
Agency, sets out the quality checks and standards to which BAPW members
must adhere.
Mr Coles was due to remain as chairman of the BAPW until the end of this
year, and the BAPW says that his decision to stand down was reached amicably.
Health
minister’s view In his address, Mr Burnham congratulated
BAPW members
as an “invisible backbone” for the health service. He said: “I
am aware that there is a huge amount of work that you and your members do, day
in day out, to stock community pharmacies safely that is of direct benefit to
patients in all the communities we serve, and it is crucially of huge importance
to the NHS. That is the private sector working hand in hand with the NHS.” |
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