Dr. Susan O'Dwyer:

I do not think you can say that. It all depends on the HSE. The HSE is the one that makes decisions around how medicines are accessed.

We have plenty of licensed medicines in Ireland with similar restrictions in order to control access and make best use of the drugs budget. When we talk about administrative burden in pharmacy it is all of those different systems. Dispensing a prescription is not as simple as it used to be. Much of a pharmacist's time and attention is focused on the administrative aspect of whether they will get paid for an item whereas it should be focused on the clinical aspect of whether it is safe for the patient, whether it interacts with their other medications and that kind of thing.