Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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162. To ask the Minister for Health if bulk buying by joint contract on an international basis with either the National Health Service in the North and in Britain or the EU has been examined for the procurement of medications and medical equipment; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9523/15]

Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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Most drugs, medicines and consumable appliances which are paid for by the HSE are supplied to patients through over 1,800 community pharmacies who, in turn, purchase them from wholesalers or, to a lesser extent, directly from drug manufacturers.

The current pharmacy based model results in over 70 million items being dispensed annually through local pharmacies across the State, including low population centres in rural areas. It enables pharmacies to receive deliveries each day from multiple wholesalers ensuring that all patients have continued access to essential medicines without delay. Under this model, as the drugs are purchased by individual pharmacies with no direct input by the HSE, there is no scope for the type of central procurement arrangement envisaged by the Deputy.

Establishing an alternative centralised distribution centre capable of distributing 70 million items across the State would be extremely difficult to achieve and would absorb any potential savings available to the HSE from directly purchasing medicines.

There is however, a Joint Procurement Agreement for medical countermeasures in place at an EU level which enables countries, including Ireland, to procure pandemic vaccines and other medical countermeasures on a group rather than individual basis.