Unichem Springvale owner Melina Holmes says Whanganui is short seven pharmacists and eight technicians. Photo / Bevan Conley
Unichem Springvale owner Melina Holmes says Whanganui is short seven pharmacists and eight technicians. Photo / Bevan Conley
No pharmacies are open in Whanganui on Sundays, a problem caused by national staff shortages.
Unichem Whanganui in Fitzherbert Ave stopped Sunday trading in February.
Until then it had been open every day of the week for 15-plus years, owner Melina Holmes said.
Staffing had "always been an issue".
"Itstarted in the smaller regions like Whanganui but, over the last few years, we are finding some of the main centres like Auckland are starting to have problems as well," Holmes said.
"It doesn't matter what part of the country you're in, no one has the staffing they need."
A whole lot of factors were behind the shortages, with the Covid-19 pandemic being an obvious one.
"People have left the workforce," Holmes said. "They might have gone on to do vaccinations, they have retired or they don't want to work the hours that they used to."
A Te Whatu Ora Health New Zealand spokesperson encouraged people to collect prescriptions between Monday and Saturday to ensure they and their whānau had what they needed.
Patients discharged from Whanganui Hospital on a Sunday would be provided with enough medication to get through to Monday.
Pharmacy Guild of New Zealand membership and professional services general manager Nicole Rickman said the guild was continuing to raise the issue of shortages with the Government and officials from the Ministry of Health and Te Whatu Ora.
There had been a shortage of pharmacists, particularly in rural areas, for many years, she said.
"A key part of our work on behalf of our members aims to improve pharmacy remuneration to help address the issue."
That led to an independent review released last September.
"This builds a strong case to the Government to improve conditions for pharmacists to help achieve a more stable pharmacy workforce," Rickman said.
Pharmacy Guild membership and professional services manager Nicole Rickman. Photo / Supplied
Holmes said Whanganui had now lost all its locum pharmacists.
Whanganui pharmacy owners worked out seven extra pharmacists and eight extra technicians were currently needed in the district, she said.
"Another calculation we did showed that seven pharmacists had been lost out of the Whanganui region over the course of the pandemic."
Central City Pharmacy owner Stacy Simpson said she had been looking for a full-time pharmacist since April.
"I probably need a technician as well but I'll take whatever I can get.
"For a while, I didn't bother advertising because it costs a lot and there was just no one applying."
Historically, contract negotiations between district health boards and pharmacy advocates hadn't been very productive, Simpson said.
"I think being undervalued for so many years is part of the reason we've reached this situation.
"The guild has done a report into how far behind pharmacy and pharmacy staff wages are compared to other health professionals. It's quite a big gap."
An independent report on wage cost pressures by Grant Thornton New Zealand, released in 2021, showed wages for community pharmacy staff were generally lower than other comparable health professional roles.
The base salary for pharmacists was around 10 per cent below comparable roles, with technicians at 17 per cent below and managers at more than 30 per cent below.
Comparable roles include radiology staff, medical radiation and imaging technologists, audiologists, and dental and laboratory roles "as appropriate to the level and nature of the relevant pharmacy role".
Whanganui's district health board (now Te Whatu Ora Health New Zealand) had approached her in the past about the possibility of opening on a Sunday, Simpson said.
"We are all just exhausted. It would be dangerous. When you're tired you can make mistakes and we don't want to be doing that."
Countdown's head pharmacist, Jeremy Armes, said its Victoria Ave store wasn't immune to the staff shortages being seen throughout the country and had needed to reduce its hours of operation to weekdays only.
"While this situation is largely out of our control, we appreciate that the changes in hours will be frustrating for the Whanganui community," Armes said.
Central City Pharmacy has been on the hunt for a pharmacist since April. Photo / Bevan Conley
The Covid-19 pandemic meant community pharmacies had been working under ever-increasing pressure, with an increased workload to help keep people out of hospitals, Rickman said.
"On top of their usual services, many have offered Covid-19 vaccinations and supervised rapid antigen testing, while often coping with reduced staffing levels due to Covid-19 isolation requirements."
Unichem had operated this week with half its dispensary staff away, Holmes said.
The store currently employs 35 people.
Because pharmacists were at the "end of the line", they often bore the brunt of the public's frustrations, she said.
"What people don't understand is that it's not just a matter of getting a box off the shelf and slapping a label on it," Holmes said.
Staff shortages affected opening hours throughout the week, not just Sunday.
"A pharmacy might have been open until 6pm and now it's 5pm.
"That doesn't mean we are working less. The doors are being closed so we can get through that work."
Closing on a Monday or Tuesday wasn't an option either.
"Every pharmacy, except for Countdown, has contracts with rest homes or supply to the methadone programme. That needs to be done Monday to Friday," Holmes said.
It takes five years of training to become a pharmacist and three to become a technician.
"We do work really, really long hours and go over and above for our patients," Simpson said.
"We do it because we care, otherwise we wouldn't still be doing it. We aren't earning the big bucks.
"I know there is a lot of excitement about Chemist Warehouse and Bargain Chemist coming to town, but that's just going to dilute the pool of pharmacists even more."
