Dear Member,
From the survey we conducted on the availability of flu stock from Alliance Healthcare and AAH we found the following:
We had 32 members who responded to our survey from which:
- 8 of these members have been unable to obtain flu stock from Alliance Healthcare and 21 from AAH.
- 490 doses from Alliance Healthcare and 705 doses from AAH have been delivered to our members who responded to the survey.
- Alliance have delivered doses to more members in smaller quantities as they appear to be restricting deliveries to 1 pack of 10 per delivery.
- AAH have been delivering much larger quantities to a lot less members and stock appears to be harder to obtain from them.
Our survey shows members have not been able to obtain the quantities they would have liked to if any at all. 2 weeks ago when the stock was first released we had reports AAH and Alliance Healthcare had prioritised the multiples, Lloyds and Boots Pharmacy, with twice daily deliveries and independent pharmacies were left not being able to obtain any stock. The DoH had specified all
stock should have been circulated fairly amongst ALL pharmacies and priority should not be given to multiples and therefore there it is important to challenge if competition law was breached in this situation.
This situation is fast moving and volatile and it is challenging to conclusively find proof or hard evidence regarding a specific matter. However, it is important we do take action to keep the suppliers on their toes and feedback to them what our members are saying.
From our members feedback it is clear we are not on an even playing field with the multiples and we have fed this back to the NPA for them to investigate this further.
Regards,
PharmaPlus
