Mr. Bernard Gloster:

Enormously so with regard to healthcare advice and being the first stop for advice and for medication, medication administration, vaccination and vaccination programmes. These are done very well by pharmacists under protocol. We speak quite often about the central point at which we hold or understand a patient's story.

There is potentially a bigger part for pharmacy to play in that than many people might think. When I think about primary care as the place to which we are trying to shift the emphasis of healthcare for the future, there is a tendency to default to GPs supported by the HSE and allied health professionals. However, when we think about primary care, we must think about the full spectrum, and pharmacy must be right up at the top of that.