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We are the only trade association representing the interests of manufacturers of branded OTC medicines, self-care medical devices and food supplements in the UK.

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Our previous self-care activity

Find out about the activity PAGB has delivered to promote self-care.

Influencing a new government

In the lead up to the 2024 General Election, PAGB engaged with parties from across the political spectrum to keep the self-care high on the political agenda. We developed an election toolkit and a self-care manifesto which detailed PAGB’s key asks:

Self-care manifesto

Ahead of the general election, we met with parties to share our expertise in the areas of self-care that we outlined in our manifesto to ensure that self-care was considered and incorporated into all planning on how we solve the challenges facing primary care within the NHS going forward. Read our Self-Care Manifesto to find out more about our calls to Government. In short, these included:

Improve patient awareness and confidence in self-care

Leverage digital tools to better support and promote self-care

Create a supportive self-care environment, empowering community pharmacies to promote self-care

Election toolkit

We also developed an Election Toolkit to support our members with their engagement with MPs, government bodies and prospective parliamentary candidates on policy priorities. The toolkit outlined the case for prioritising self-care, highlighting public interest, the cost savings to the NHS and the economic benefits of the over-the-counter (OTC) sector.

It put forward recommendations on behalf of the consumer healthcare industry on how to realise the potential of self-care and create a supportive environment to best implement self-care and the ‘Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care’.

Read our Election Toolkit. Tailored party specific Toolkits are also available in the members area.

The key asks outlined included:

To fully integrate pharmacy’s role in primary care

For the UK to remain a leader in reclassification

To recognise the OTC sector as a cornerstone of the UK life sciences sector

To ensure an attractive regulatory environment for the UK OTC sector

Implementing self-care policy

In May 2023, the Government and NHS England published the ‘Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care’. As a direct result of our work with the Self-Care Strategy Group, the plan included self-care policies which sought to empower people by rolling out tools they can use to manage their own health.

We worked with the Self-Care Strategy Group to ensure the implementation of the commitments in the plan and developed a number of tools to help support the Government and NHS England to deliver these self-care policies.

Supporting the implementation of the Government’s delivery plan for recovering primary care

In this implementation guide the Self-Care Strategy Group details three tests which all self-care policies in the ‘Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care should consider’:

1. Does it improve patient access and patient outcomes to primary care?
2. Does it lessen health inequalities in the system?
3. Does it empower patients?

It has been disseminated, along with meeting requests, to key Government and NHS England stakeholders. We have already made significant progress, with a successful meeting taking place between CEO, Michelle Riddalls and health minister, Andrea Leadsom.

Read the guidance

Taking stock of the Government’s delivery plan for recovering primary care: One-year-on review

The review from the Self-Care Strategy Group focuses on:

1. Progress to date, looking at how the policies that have been implemented are positively impacting people’s ability to self-care and helping to relieve pressure on primary care.

2. Existing areas for improvement where further progress could be made to support or encourage full implementation of the Delivery plan’s commitments on self-care.

3. Recommendations and actionable steps that the Government and NHS England should take to build upon the Delivery plan’s commitments to effectively support self-care and improve access to primary care.

Read the report

Self-care stakeholder engagement

PAGB’s work on self-care has helped us to forge close working relationships with leading pharmacy organisations within the Self-Care Strategy Group. We also proactively shared our key policy asks with policymakers, parliamentarians and officials within NHS.

Notable meetings in 2024 included meetings with: Rt Hon Dame Andrea Leadsom, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Public Health, Start for Life and Primary Care; Wes Streeting, Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care; Rushanara Ali, Shadow Minister for Investment and Small Business; and Jim Shannon, Democratic Unionist Party’s Health Spokesperson.