DISCARDED medicines could pay for as many as 100 hip replacement operations, 600 cataract removals or 18 practice nurses each year, The Evening Star reveals today. Health officials in Suffolk said dumped medicines in the county cost more than £400,000 a year.
By Richard Cornwell
DISCARDED medicines could pay for as many as 100 hip replacement operations, 600 cataract removals or 18 practice nurses each year, The Evening Star reveals today.
Health officials in Suffolk said the medicines – many of them repeat prescriptions which were not needed and later placed in dump bins in pharmacies – cost more than £400,000 a year.
Nationally, the cost to the NHS of unused prescriptions is colossal – with some £96million of medicines wasted.
Now primary care trusts in East Suffolk have teamed up to help curb the wastage problem and persuade people to think before they order.
FULL STORY IN YOUR SATURDAY STAR
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