Committee backs more non-prescription medicines

More medicines should be made available over-the-counter than by prescription-only and pharmacists should consider publicly displaying dispensing fees and mark-up fees to help patients make informed choices, according to a new report.

And instead of benchmarking drug prices against a ‘basket’ of nine countries which the State does when calculating an ‘average’ price, it should expand to take in 15 countries to ensure that lower cost countries are included.

These are among the recommendations of the Oireachtas Health Committee Report on the Cost of Prescription Drugs in Ireland, designed to reduce the long-term cost of pharmaceutical drugs, and increase the use of generic drugs.