Agricultural merchants have been ordered to hide all veterinary medicines that will require a prescription, including animal dosing products, from view of customers, from 28 January.

The move, which is similar to that applied by shopkeepers to cigarettes, will cost merchants significantly, they say.

“This stipulation will put enormous expense on our members and will result in complete re-fitting of shop layouts,” Ian Scott of the Independent Licensed Merchants Association (ILMA) told the Irish Farmers Journal.

“We are now also hearing that prescriptions will be brand-specific so will in turn favour vet-only brands.”

Confusion

Confusion remains within the animal health sector over proposed changes to how farmers purchase animal medicines after the 28 January 2022 deadline.

The ILMA, along with ICOS, the Irish Pharmacy Union (IPU) and the ACORN group of merchants met with Department of Agriculture officials last week to get an update on the rollout of e-prescribing and what merchants, vets and farmers will have to do under the new legislation.

The proposal is that prescriptions will be emailed or sent via text message by the vet with a unique number to the farmer so they can go to a dispenser to purchase the product.

The meeting heard that over 80% of vet practices do not have the IT infrastructure in place to operate the new e-prescribing system.

“To be honest we were more confused coming out of the meeting than we were going into the meeting,” Scott said.

“The Department has shown no regard for the huge changes that are due to be implemented within the next eight to nine weeks.

“There has been no training for vets, no training for merchants and no communication with farmers on the current proposals and how they will work and we are only weeks away from the changes coming into law,” he added.

Stakeholders, including farm organisations and the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, have called for a deferral of the introduction of the new laws until the current issues have been resolved.