8:30pm Friday 10th October 2008
By Joanna Lean
EVERY pharmacy in Warrington will cost around £3,000 more a month to run after the Department of Health agreed a new contract.
The additional costs will push NHS Warrington over budget.
The costs emerged following a national trend of high prescribing.
In Warrington however, GPs have not been prescribing more drugs than usual.
The money will have to be funded by NHS Warrington, formerly Warrington Primary Care Trust, as it is unlikely that any extra money will come from the Government.
“Presumably if there is no money this year then there is no money next year either,” Ray Beale-Pratt, finance director of NHS Warrington, told the organisation’s monthly board meeting last Wednesday.
The new contract will cost £202m nationally from now until March 2009.
It will not have an effect on prescription charges.
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