UK NEWS

PRESCRIPTION FEES? ‘YOU CAN AFFORD IT’

NEEDS THE MONEY: Alan Johnson

Thursday May 1,2008

By Victoria Fletcher Health Editor

FREE parking at hospitals and free prescriptions – both provided in Wales – will not be introduced in England.

The £435million raised by prescription charges was a “large slug of money” that was needed by the NHS, Health Secretary Alan Johnson told nurses.

He later explained to reporters that Middle England – or people with jobs “like mine and yours” as he put it – could afford the £7.10 charge. Speaking at the Royal College of Nursing conference in Bournemouth, he said that 88 per cent of patients in England receive their prescriptions free.

It was up to devolved countries, he said, to decide whether to charge patients.

Although he conceded that relatives who have to visit patients every day should be given free parking, he added: “I am happy to leave it to local trusts.” In England, patients pay more than £100million a year in parking charges which vary dramatically across the country.

Last night Anthony Halperin, chairman of the Patients’ Association, was angered by the comments. “We think that if patients in Wales get free prescriptions so should those in England,” he said.

“But you should not have to pay a postcode lottery of charges to park when you go to see a loved one. It is a tax on people who wish to see relatives who are not well.”

Mr Johnson claimed that patients who could not afford prescription charges tended not to have to pay them.

But, earlier this year, a survey suggested that more than 800,000 patients did not pick up prescriptions in 2007 because they could not afford them.

Citizens’ Advice said some of the poorest and sickest were risking their health, despite the fact that a report by MPs demanded a rethink of charges.

Nothing has so far been done, but Mr Johnson announced that he would be launching a consultation.