Subject: DOH:PHARMACY FOR FELLAS DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH 2004/0143 20 April 2004 PHARMACY FOR FELLAS Winterton urges men to use their pharmacies Men were yesterday urged to make the most of pharmacists who can provide them with easy access to valuable health advice by Health Minister Rosie Winterton. Speaking at a joint meeting of the All Party Pharmacy Group and Men's Health Forum Rosie Winterton said: "Research shows that men can be reluctant health service users who make poor use of preventative services and can tend to avoid going to see the doctor unless they are in significant pain or an illness has become too serious to ignore. "Men are significantly more likely to die than women from a number of causes, including suicides, drug-related poisonings, lung cancer and coronary heart disease. They can expect to spend 15 years of their lives suffering from a serious or chronic illness. "The challenge for all of us is to reach these people, such as the 50 year old male smoker who does not routinely access health services but wants to give up smoking. Pharmacies have an advantage - people visit them when they are well, not just when they are sick. "Pharmacists' roles are changing and they are now providing smoking cessation courses; measuring blood pressure and body mass index, to actively support public health campaigns on smoking, diet, physical activity and reducing obesity. And it is through advice and provision of these services that pharmacists can help build on the very good news of a 10 per cent fall in premature deaths from cancer since 1995/1997, and a 23 per cent reduction in heart-related deaths between then and 2000/2002. "The government made clear in A Vision for Pharmacy in the new NHS published last year its intention to ensure an NHS where people have the greatest choice about the time and place they can seek advice and help. And this should apply to everyone, including men." Notes to Editors 1. The strategy for developing NHS Pharmacy services is set out in A Vision for Pharmacy in the new NHS, published on 17 July 2003. Consultation on the proposals will continue until 17 October. It can be accessed on: http://www.dh.gov.uk/Consultations/ClosedConsultations/ClosedConsultationsArticle/fs/en?CONTENT_ID=4068353&chk=Y2fMuy 2. The Men's Health Forum can be contacted on tel: 020 7388 4449 and http://www.menshealthforum.org.uk/ . The Men's Health Forum is in partnership with the DPP: Developing Patient Partnerships on a new campaign 'Pop down your local' to inform men about the services available from pharmacies and encourage more men to use the pharmacy for health advice and treatments. The campaign - 'Pop down your local' - launching on April 29 has been developed in partnership with a number of organisations including The Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, The Consumer Health Information Centre (CHIC), National Pharmaceutical Association, and Blood Pressure Association. 3. The All Party Pharmacy Group can be contacted via the website http://www.appg.org.uk which was also launched at the event. 4. Media enquiries only to Malcolm Fawcett Department of Health Media Centre, Tel: 020 7210 4984, email: malcolm.fawcett@doh.gsi.gov.uk -------------------------------------------------------------------- GNNREF: 93436 Issued by : DOH Press Office Contact : If you have any queries relating to this press release, please forward this e-mail to the Press Office e-mail address provided above, or alternatively contact the originating Press Office by telephone. (Media queries only) Please DO NOT attempt to reply to the sender of this e-mail. The sender is involved solely as a broadcasting agent and cannot process e-mailed queries. Any attached files with a .DOC extension should be read using a word processor capable of reading Word 97 files. If you believe that the originating body is sending you Word 2000 files that you are not yet capable of reading, ask them to save future files in an earlier version.