Alex Jennings
More than half of the community pharmacies in the UK did not meet the Falsified Medicines Directive (FMD) deadline for implementation, the body running the system in the UK has confirmed.
Figures published by SecurMed, the organisation that operates the UK National Medicines Verification System, which holds data from FMD-compliant medicine packs in the UK, show that 6,288 community pharmacies were compliant with FMD requirements on 12 February 2019, three days after the 9 February 2019 deadline. SecurMed estimates that there are 15,000 community pharmacies in the UK, meaning that approximately 42% are signed up to FMD.
The SecurMed figures also show that 285 hospital pharmacies were FMD compliant on 12 February 2019. This constitutes 63% of 450 hospital pharmacies in the UK, covering both the NHS and private sector.
A third of wholesalers holding a wholesale dealer’s licence (731 out of 2,150 [34%]) had signed up to FMD by 12 February 2019, while 12.5% of dispensing doctors (149 out of 1,200) also met the deadline.
Earlier in February 2019, SecurMed told The Pharmaceutical Journal that it expected less than half of pharmacies in the UK to meet the FMD deadline.
