Woolworths backpedals
July 3, 2014
In WHAT looks like a fumbled
series of embarrassing decisions,
Woolworths now appears to have
backed down on its intention to
employ pharmacy students and
‘graduating pharmacists’ to conduct
unsupervised in-store health checks.
The move had been soundly
criticised by the Pharmacy Guild,
PSA and the Australian Medical
Association, with the health move
undertaken alongside top-selling
supermarket lines such as cigarettes
and alcohol.
However Woolworths now says
it will focus on employing nurses -
despite the original advertisement
on seek.com, placed by the firm
XPO Brands which works for
Woolworths, calling for pharmacy
students and graduates to apply.
Guild executive director David
Quilty said that Woolworths had
acknowledged its “ownership” of
the advertisement widely over the
last 48 hours, “so it is a bit lame
now to be trying to disown it”.
However he said that Woolworths
still doesn’t get it.
“In pursuing some form of health
service in their supermarket aisles
- whether delivered by student
pharmacists or nurses - they are
flying in the face of the fact that
they are a prime purveyor of
cigarettes, products which are
unambiguously deleterious to
people’s health,” Quilty wrote in
the latest edition of Forefront.
He said the “sorry affair” had
highlighted the lack of any genuine
commitment to healthcare on the
part of Woolworths.
“The idea that young pharmacy
students and graduates would
be put at professional risk by
Woolworths in a way that might
mislead consumers was never
worthy of support,” Quilty added.
He also said it was a “shame”
that union group Professional
Pharmacists Australia (PD
yesterday) “would happily see
student pharmacists compromised
by working unsupervised,
unqualified and untrained in a
supermarket aisle”.
MEANWHILE the Society of
Hospital Pharmacists has also
joined the debate, warning that
pharmacy students and interns
must be supervised.
SHPA president Professor Michael
Dooley said that discussions of
health issues with consumers -
including in a supermarket aisle -
“would be perceived by the general
public as providing health advice.
“Providing advice without
appropriate supervision or
qualifications would be a breach of
the registration requirements of a
pharmacist,” Dooley said.
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