NHS to stop paying for routine medicines such as painkillers

THE NHS will no longer pay for everyday medicines, including painkillers and cough mixture, the head of the health service has said.

Simon Stevens last night outlined plans for patients to have to pay for basic items, like hayfever drugs, indigestion pills and gluten-free food, in a money-saving drive.

The cuts are part of new measures to reduce £1 billion of costs in the health service, which is struggling to cope with a surge in demand caused by an expanding population.

Under the new rules, doctors will be banned from “routinely” prescribing items that are cheaply avail- able in high street chemists. Coeliacs will be forced to buy their own gluten-free food and patients will also be denied free travel vaccinations.

Mr Stevens is also pledging to crack down on the expense of treating patients from the European Union by recuperating the cost from visitors’ home countries, as well as cutting the cost of employing expensive locum doctors.

The chief executive of NHS England has previously said that the NHS faces “bloody tough” times, with little money to spare.

Outlining his new plans, he also called on families to take some of the strain off the health service by taking

better care of elderly relations and more closely controlling the diets of children.

The new strategy involves fresh targets to move more elderly people not in need of critical care out of hospital to free up beds, as well as a further crackdown on the hiring of expensive locum doctors.

The Department of Health last week pledged to free up hospital beds by allowing more people to be treated in their own homes. At the moment, about five per cent of the 137,000 NHS beds are taken up by so-called bed-blockers, who are not able to leave because of lack of social care.

Mr Stevens said that while the NHS is efficient, there is still some waste that should be stopped.

The clawback will prove controversial with the 1 per cent of people in the UK who are intolerant to wheat and need gluten-free food.

“There’s £114 million being spent on medicines for upset tummies, haemorrhoids, travel sickness, indigestion, that’s even before you get on to the £22 million-plus on gluten-free that you can also now get at Morrisons, Lidl or Tesco’s,” Mr Stevens told the Daily Mail.

“We will be backing them in new national guidelines that say those should not routinely be prescribed on the NHS.

“Part of what we are trying to do is make sure that we make enough headroom to spend money on the innovative new drugs by not wasting it on these kind of items.

“The price of gluten-free alternatives has come down substantially.

“There’s no doubt that coeliac disease is an important medical condition that’s increasingly being recognised. But when you look at the list of prescribable items it extends to digestive biscuits, pizzas and other products – there are legitimate questions to be answered.”

One in 10 patients is currently eligible for free prescriptions.

Mr Stevens’ NHS Delivery Plan will be officially announced on Friday.