Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the potential impact of community pharmacy closures on patients.

With NHS England, we are monitoring the market and the impact on patient access to pharmaceutical services. An estimated 80% of the population lives within 20 minutes’ walk of a community pharmacy and there are double the number of pharmacies in more deprived areas. There are over 11,000 community pharmacies in England and the Pharmacy Access Scheme provides additional funding for areas where there are fewer pharmacies.