Report published on pharmacy services in England

The General Pharmaceutical Services report provides information on community pharmacies and appliance contractors in England, the NHS services they provided and associated costs, between 2015/16 to 2021/22.

Key findings of the report are below:

• There were 11,500 active community pharmacies and 111 active appliance contractors in England during 2021/22. This is the lowest number of active contractors since 2015/16.
• A total of 308 new pharmacies opened during 2021/22, while 418 pharmacies closed.
• 1.05 billion prescription items were dispensed by community pharmacies and appliance contractors in England in 2021/22. This is a 2.65% increase from 2020/21.
• 1.00 billion prescription items were dispensed via the Electronic Prescription Service (EPS) in 2021/22, 95.3% of all items dispensed, an increase of 1.35 percentage points from 2020/21.
• The cost of drugs and appliances reimbursed to community pharmacies and appliance contractors totalled £9.05 billion in 2021/22. This is a 0.83% increase from 2020/21.
• 85 million seasonal influenza vaccines were administered by community pharmacies in 2021/22. This was a 75.1% increase from the 2.77 million vaccines administered in 2020/21.

To read the full report go to https://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/statistical-collections/general-pharmaceutical-services-england/general-pharmaceutical-services-england-201516-202122

This publication is a National Statistic release. National Statistics status means that General Pharmaceutical Services (GPhS) - England meets the highest standards of trustworthiness, quality, and public value, and complies with all aspects of the Code of Practice for Statistics.