Campaign group Best for Britain warns of cost to health secretary’s stockpiling strategy

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

The health secretary’s plan to set aside six weeks’ worth of vital medicines to avoid supply disruptions in the event of a no-deal Brexit could cost up to £2bn, campaign group Best for Britain warns today.

Matt Hancock wrote to healthcare providers last week, saying the government would set in motion plans to “ensure the UK has an additional six weeks’ supply of medicines in case imports from the EU through certain routes are affected”.

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Data collated by thinktank the King’s Fund earlier this year suggested the total drugs bill for the NHS in 2016-17 was £17.4bn.

Best for Britain suggests that could make the cost of the temporary stockpile – which would presumably then be run down over future months – £2bn.

Owen Smith, the former shadow Northern Ireland secretary and a supporter of Best for Britain, said: “I don’t remember anyone warning that Brexit would mean we’d have to stockpile drugs or that this would cost the NHS and taxpayers up to £2bn. Maybe they should have slapped that on the side of the bus.



“Every day it seems as though there is another hidden cost being revealed.”

Hancock’s letter urged local GPs and pharmacists not to hoard medicines themselves, but to rely on the official scheme. It added that the government will also put in place “separate arrangements for the air freight of medicines with short shelf-lives, such as medical radioisotopes”.

It is unclear whether the taxpayer will bear the cost of the stockpiling scheme. A Department of Health spokesman said at this stage the government was only “asking suppliers to provide specific information on their stockpiling programme to gauge how prepared the industry is before we decide the next steps”.

He added: “We have put in place a dedicated team to support suppliers in making arrangements for stockpiling and we will work with companies to develop plans to minimise any additional costs.”

Hancock’s plan was published last week alongside 24 no-deal “technical notices” intended to inform consumers and businesses what would happen if Britain exits the EU next March without a trade deal.

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The Brexit secretary, Dominic Raab, will return to Brussels to resume negotiations later this week, and has insisted he expects to reach agreement with the EU27.

But the notices included warnings that British citizens living in EU countries could lose access to payments from their pensions and bank accounts, credit card payments could become more expensive and exporters would immediately face tariffs for goods on sale to the EU.

Theresa May, who is travelling in Africa this week, told journalists a no-deal outcome – which some hardline Brexiters believe would be preferable to her Chequers plan – was “not the end of the world”.