Madam, - Your editorial "The Wrong Prescription" (March 5th) missed the point. From March 1st the pharmacist is being paid 92 per cent of the cost price of each prescription dispensed for medical card holders (80 per cent of all prescriptions). You don't have to have a degree in accountancy to see that this is not sustainable.
The "saving" envisaged by the HSE from this reduction is €100 million. As there are approximately 1,500 pharmacies in State medical schemes, this means an average reduction of €65,000 a year in their incomes. No worker should be expected to accept such a reduction.
As the pharmacists' income is being scrutinised almost daily in the media, in the interest of transparency, the HSE might tell us what annual bonuses the handful of executives in its pharmacy unit might expect if they can successfully force these changes through.
Since the inception of the medical card scheme in 1972 many changes and many new schemes have come into existence very smoothly, with the public often not being aware of them. This was due to the Department of Health negotiating these changes with the Irish Pharmacy Union. The pharmacy sector has been one of the success stories of the health service. The HSE has lost all credibility with the public but it takes a special form of incompetence to take an efficient and successful service and turn it into chaos. - Yours, etc,
JOHN WILLIAMS,
Pharmacist,
Kilkee,
Co Clare.