REORGANISATION OF PHARMACY

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 263, 3 August 1936, Page 10

REORGANISATION OF PHARMACY

Modern Service the Object REDUCING WHOLESALE COSTS Confirmation of the fact that proposals for a merger of the wholesale interests in the drug trade of the Dominion as part of a comprehensive scheme for the reorganisation of pharmacy in New Zealand were still in their preliminary stages was given by Mr. H. J. S. Rickard, president of the Pharmacy Board of New Zealand, in an interview on Saturday. Mr. Rickard pointed out that no scheme of merger had yet been completed, and no name had been decided upon as the name of the merger company. He also indicated that it was incorrect to say, as was recently reported at Auckland, that protection was being sought from the Government to prevent the sale of all chemists’ lines by other than registered chemists. The plan submitted, he said, resulted from the recent report of the Industries and Commerce Committee, in which chemists were asked to reorganise the profession with .a view to reducing the cost of medicine to the public. The merger proposals were part of that plan, and the Government was being asked to standardise the price of medicines throughout the Dominion, and to confine to chemists the sale of newly-introduced medicinal products more particularly associated with a chemist's business.

It was not proposed to interfere in any way with the present channels of distribution so far as proprietary medicines which did not contain poisons were concerned, nor with the sale of ordinary household packed drugs such as boracic acid, olive oil, senna leaves, vaseline, aspirin and similar products. From the public’s point of view a better service would be given, a cheaper medicine would be supplied, more pharmacies would operate in remote centres, and machinery would be erected for a national health service throughout the Dominion. Mr. C. L. Butchers, general secretary of the Pharmaceutical Association of Australia and New Zealand, who has been in Wellington for the past month in connection with the reorganisation scheme, amplified Mr. Rickard’s statement by saying that the merger plans had as their objective the establishment of an important key chemical industry in New Zealand as well as the reduction of the prime cost of drugs and medicines. Tlie basic policy upon which the company would operate, he said, would be the supplying to chemists of their requirements at the lowest possible price, and the company would budget very closely to be in a position to offer competitive prices, “Tbe whole plan is intended to rationalise pharmacy and place it on a footing that will enable chemists to promote a modern service in all centres to the public,” said Mr. Butchers. “The licensing of all pharmacies is an important part of the reorganisation scheme, the object being to bring about a more equal spread of pharmaceutical services throughout the Dominion.”