Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has considered adjusting prescription charges for partial emergency supplies of medication.

There are currently no plans to adjust the prescription charge for emergency supplies of medicines. Under the Urgent Medicine Supply (UMS) element of the National Health Service Pharmacy First Service, NHS 111 can refer patients to a pharmacy to obtain an emergency supply of a medicine they regularly receive. Patients who receive an urgent supply under the UMS will be charged their usual prescription fee if they are not exempt. Where an emergency supply is made outside of the UMS, it is for the pharmacy to charge as they think is appropriate given that they will not be reimbursed by the NHS, as the medicine was not dispensed against an NHS prescription.