The Department of Agriculture is examining the option of breaking the link between prescribing and dispensing veterinary medicines in the implementation of a new EU directive which will place restrictions on the sale of certain products.
From January 2022, the new laws will require farmers to get prescription from vets to use antiparasitics (eg doses for treating worms/liver fluke) for livestock.
Currently, hundreds of trained ‘Responsible Persons’ provide a similar farm drug supply service to farmers at more than 900 licensed merchant and co-op stores and 300 pharmacies nationwide.
Speaking at a recent Oireachtas Agriculture Committee meeting on the topic, the Department’s Colm Forde said: “If all of these medicines are now going to require a prescription, the best way of ensuring a competitive supply chain is to break the link between prescribing and dispensing.