The health department has expressed concern the Pharmacy Guild appears to be using patient contact details from its “Find a Pharmacy” website to campaign against 60-day medicine dispensing.
Meanwhile, the Australian Medical Association has labelled the Pharmacy Guild’s opposition to the new rules a “sick joke”.
Patients have reported receiving emails and robocalls from the guild warning they are at risk of prescription medicine shortages, followed up by text messages directing them to medicineshortages.com.au, despite claiming to have only provided their details through the Find a Pharmacy website.
Penny Shakespeare, the deputy secretary of health resourcing, told Senate estimates the department concluded it was “likely” the website was the source of patient contact details, including that she was “pretty sure” that was how her son received an email from the Guild.
On 2 June, Shakespeare said “concerns been raised from a number of people about use of their information and don’t have any idea how that information was obtained, other than identifying information provided when they obtained covid vaccinations from a pharmacy”.
A spokesperson for the Guild said the “assertion that the Guild has access to patient vaccination information from pharmacies is categorically incorrect”.
“The Guild adheres to all relevant privacy laws and regulations,” the spokesperson said.
In April the health minister, Mark Butler, announced the move towards 60-day prescriptions as part of a push to save patients $1.6bn over four years on medicines for chronic conditions.
Despite the government’s promise to reinvest savings in community pharmacies, the guild has targeted the prime minister, Anthony Albanese in in-store and on-medicine messages and tried to link the reform to medicine shortages and even the possibility of children overdosing.
Shakespeare said the department was “concerned” because such use of patient information “might discourage people from taking advantage of important public health measures in future”.
The Find a Pharmacy website does allow users to click-through to a privacy statement that explains the guild “may also use your information for direct marketing in relation to The Guild and associated services”.
“We use your information to promote the services and issues affecting community pharmacies across Australia, as well as keeping you up to date on services that we think will interest you. This marketing may be by email, phone, SMS, post or online.”
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Shakespeare acknowledged that users “may tick on a box that allows reuse for other purposes”.
The Australian Medical Association’s president, Prof Steve Robson, said “we understand that advocacy bodies will go in hard when they object to government policies, but asking the community to sign up for a campaign that will ultimately make people pay more for their medicines is a sick joke”.
“People will be really surprised to find out that the information they provided when searching for pharmacy services is now being used for a political campaign,” he told Guardian Australia.
“Health professionals regard people’s personal information as sacrosanct, not a plaything.”
The health department estimates individual pharmacies could lose up to $49,000 in the first year of the change, increasing to $158,000 in the fourth year.
According to an analysis submitted to the Office of Impact Analysis, pharmacies will in total lose about $1.2bn over the first four years.