Mr. Darragh O'Loughlin:

A number of questions have been raised. I will not field them all but will invite my colleagues to respond.

I can start with Senator Crown's questions. I acknowledge and thank him for his observation that pharmacy acts as effectively a band-aid on a limping health service. His question was around whether we need to re-engineer pharmacy education and training to provide pharmacists with the skills to take on the new roles being discussed. The education and training of pharmacists in Ireland has actually evolved dramatically in the course of the past decade. It is 20 years since I qualified as a pharmacist. If I were to start in first year in any of the three pharmacy schools in the country now, I would be learning much of this for the first time. The skill set and the knowledge base are in place already. The Irish pharmacy degree and training comply with the relevant EU directive, which means we receive the same training and skill sets as pharmacists in any EU country. In other countries, all of these services are being delivered quite effectively. As our skill set and training is analogous to that in countries such as Canada, Irish pharmacists do not struggle to re-register in Canada.

The Senator referred to pharmacists' moving from following instructions to making independent clinical-type decisions. Every day, pharmacists are making independent decisions, albeit around minor ailments, and referring people to other parts of the health care service and to other health care professionals as appropriate. He also asked about pharmacy business models and how they are changing, the impact of the Internet and pharmacy chains. I invite Mr. Daragh Connolly to respond to that question, as he has done some work in the area.