Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that pharmacies across the country have sufficient supplies of the antibiotics used to treat strep A.

The Department is working urgently with manufacturers and wholesalers to explore what can be done to expedite deliveries and bring forward stock they have to help ensure it gets to where it is needed, to meet demand as quickly as possible and support access to these vital medicines.

Further, Serious Shortage Protocols (SSPs) have been issued across the United Kingdom for penicillin medicines, which will help mitigate local supply issues by allowing pharmacists to supply alternative forms of the medicine, or alternative antibiotics, if they do not have the product stated on the prescription.