Patients in England have lost around seven million hours of pharmacy access in the last two years, analysis from the National Pharmacy Association (NPA) has suggested.

And around one in eight have seen their local pharmacy close for good, the NPA said.

Inadequate funding could force pharmacies to reduce access by a further one million hours, if collective action is recommended by the organisation following an unsatisfactory contractual offer, it warned.

Millions of hours of pharmacy access lost

In October 2022, the community pharmacy network in England was open for a combined total of 620,000 hours each week - totalling an estimated 32,240,000 throughout the year.

But by October 2024, community pharmacies were open for a combined total of 551,000 hours each week, or 28,652,000 hours in the year.

This suggests that over the two intervening years, pharmacies were open for 7,176,000 hours less than they would have been if access had remained at 2022 levels.

This comes as around 1,250 pharmacies have shut for good since 2017, the NPA said.

'Given that pharmacies each serve an average of 5,600 people that means that up to seven million people have seen their local pharmacy close, around one in eight of England’s population,' the NPA added.

The analysis is based on opening hour information and localised details contained in the NHS Consolidated Pharmaceutical List.

Rural patients forced to travel further for care

The NPA raised concerns that patients in rural areas were being forced to travel further to access support, especially since in many small communities pharmacies are the only medical care facility.

Nick Kaye, NPA chair, described the figures as 'shocking', and said: 'When pharmacies close, it means people have to travel further for care and the pharmacies that remain have to work harder to meet demand.

'When they are forced to cut hours to make ends meet it means people don’t have such flexibility to get advice or pick up medicines.'

The  Local Government Association (LGA) recently warned that ongoing pharmacy closures could have 'serious, unintended consequences' on patients.

The NPA also found that as of September 2024, West Berkshire had the fewest pharmacies per patient and was also the area which had seen the highest rate of pharmacy closures in England.

Meanwhile in Cornwall, nine pharmacies have shut in the last two years, placing one of the most rural council areas in the top 10 areas in the country for pharmacy closures.

The NPA has also previously warned that disproportionately low pharmacy provision and over-reliance on one pharmacy group could put rural areas at risk of becoming a 'pharmacy desert'.

And The Pharmacist’s exclusive mapping of pharmacy closures has suggested that the most deprived areas in England have lost nearly five times as many community pharmacy premises as the least deprived areas in the last five years.

Many of those closures were also in rural and/or coastal areas, which has the potential to exacerbate 'digital divides' in healthcare access, The Pharmacist found.

Immediate funding needed or situation will worsen, says NPA

If pharmacies cut their opening hours to contractual minimums, a further one million hours of pharmacy time would be lost, the NPA warned.

This could happen if the NPA recommends 'work-to-rule'-style collective action, an option which is still on the table if the new contract offer from the government does not meet its five 'tests', it said.

'We’re relieved to hear that talks have finally begun for the long overdue pharmacy settlement but unless urgent and sustained increases in pharmacy funding are delivered imminently, this situation will only worsen and patients will face more and more difficulties getting the care they need and pharmacies will have no choice but to cut their services further to make ends meet,' Mr Kaye said.