Ulster Unionist Party Leader, Doug Beattie MC MLA, has written to EU Commission Vice President Maroš Šefcovic to highlight the harmful impact that the Northern Ireland Protocol is having on the supply of medicines from Great Britain to Northern Ireland. The importance of this week and next in resolving this issue cannot be overestimated.
STARTS
Maroš Šefčovič Vice-President,
EU Co-Chair of the Withdrawal Agreement Joint Committee, European Commission, Rue de la Loi / Wetstraat 200, 1049 Brussels
23rd June 2021
Dear Maroš,
I am writing to you in my capacity as Leader of the Ulster Unionist Party. We are the political party that from January 2020 has held the Health Ministry in the Northern Ireland Executive.
Whilst I am sure your focus is understandably right across the breadth of important UK EU exit matters, I would like to draw your attention to the increasingly harmful impact the Northern Ireland Protocol is having on medicine supplies.
Northern Ireland, as a constituent part of the United Kingdom, has long had a deep and integrated connection with Great Britain on the issue of the supply of medicines and medical devices. Approximately 98% of all the medicines supplied to Northern Ireland come from Great Britain. Quite simply there is no separate Northern Ireland market, and instead all UK nations rely on the same supply model which also helpfully provides parity in the context of the NHS in terms of pricing and access to treatments for all our citizens.
As a result of the Northern Ireland Protocol – a protocol that we had no hand in negotiating and the impacts of which are becoming increasingly unworkable - Northern Ireland will be forced to follow EU rules and regulations for medicines and medical devices, whereas the three nations of Great Britain will not.
I want to make it clear that despite what you may believe to be the case or are currently being advised by your officials this will have a profound impact on both the supply and regulation of medicines here in Northern Ireland.
I therefore urge you to recognise the impact of the requirement for medicines crossing the Irish Sea first requiring additional batch testing and verification. There are also fundamental issues in relation to medicines packaging and regulation.
These barriers, given the relatively small size of the local population, are already seeing some companies coming to the decision to deem Northern Ireland to be no longer commercially viable and as a consequence they are already pre-emptively choosing to discontinue or reduce their product ranges.
You may be aware that the pharmaceutical industry is legally obliged to give the Department of Health and Social Care six months’ notice of discontinuations to the UK market. As such, with little more than six months until the end of the grace period for medicines regulation on 31 December 2021, the importance of this week and next cannot be overestimated.
I trust that you agree it would be entirely unreasonable and unacceptable for citizens in Northern Ireland to no longer have the same access to the full range of medicines as citizens in the rest of the United Kingdom.
I have spoken to my Party colleague Robin Swann MLA - the Minister for Health in Northern Ireland – and I believe options are currently being explored between the United Kingdom Government and the European Commission to protect the supply of medicines between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. I urge you to look at the proposals favourably and urgently.
Much damage has already been inflicted by the Northern Ireland Protocol, so it should be an absolute priority to avoid any more.
Yours sincerely,
Doug Beattie MC MLA
Leader, Ulster Unionist Party
ENDS