Change simplifies access to the pill

Some women will be able to get contraceptive pills directly from pharmacists with only one doctor’s prescription required every three years.

Medsafe said yesterday that it had accepted recommendations from the Medicines Classification Committee. The changes would come into effect by the end of the month and once pharmacists had been properly trained.

The changes follow years of negotiations over proposals by Green Cross Health, which has the Life Pharmacy and Unichem brands.

About 200,000 NZ women take oral contraceptives.

Green Cross says: “The cost to customers will be $45 for a three-month supply of oral contraceptives.”

But doctors have expressed concern that the changes could undermine the relationship between women and their GPs and might cost women more.

Medsafe says: “The reclassification would mean that pharmacists can sell up to Customers must be 16-39 for the combined pill, or 16-52 for the progesteroneonly pill. Pharmacists must have special training. of six months’ supply of selected oral contraceptives to a woman who has been prescribed the same type of oral contraceptive within the last three years from the date of an original medical practitioner’s prescription and has not developed risk factors.”

The five types of contraceptives covered will remain “prescription”, with an exemption for pharmacists to sell them under a new set of rules.

Until now, women have needed a doctor’s or nurse’s prescription, or repeat prescriptions, for each six months’ supply.