Portland Amcal pharmacy manager frustrated with concessional RAT rollout, growing responsibilities

Portland Amcal pharmacy manager Kylie Zordan said staff "felt like a broken record" on Monday as they were forced to turn away concession-card holders.

"The Pharmacy Guild has setup a program for us to do the free RATs for concession card holders, but our suppliers have not been able to get us stock to start," she said.

"We have to pay for them upfront and then we get reimbursed, but they're just not available. We're very, very frustrated. It's a lot of work for pharmacies to do for the small reimbursements we get.

"We had a lot of calls, a lot of pensioners don't use the computer or the internet to notice what we've put up, they either ring or they come in and they can't understand why we don't have them. They say they've been told they can get them.

"It's very hard for the staff and we feel like a broken record."

Professional Pharmacists Australia chief executive officer Jill McCabe said it was 'concerning' the federal government would announce changes without securing supply.

"Having promised six million pensioners and concession cardholders they would get access to free rapid antigen tests, it's incumbent on the federal government to ensure that these vital tests are actually available, particularly where they are most needed, including in south western Victoria," Ms McCabe said.

"It's concerning they would announce that rapid antigen tests would be widely available for pensioners and concession cardholders, while failing to make logistical preparations to ensure that the commitment could actually be fulfilled.

"We call on the Federal Government to take all urgent steps to ensure that the most vulnerable in our community are given immediate access to free rapid antigen tests to protect their health and to reduce the spread of COVID-19."

Ms Zordan said the bungled rollout was just the latest example of the way pharmacy staff were regularly expected to expand their services with little support.

"It's been really difficult," she said.

"I've worked in this pharmacy for 30 years and I've never ever known it to be like this. The situation for pharmacy staff has just gotten worse and worse as the years have gone on and pharmacies are just at the bottom of the chain but expected to be at the top of the chain with what they give out for nothing and information."

She said any announcement related to RATs stretched her staff thin.

"When it first came out that we had to use RATs we were just inundated and we were all just beside ourselves," she said.

"The phone rang constantly - every call was about RATs and a few people complained we were rude, but do you know how stressed these girls have gotten at the end of the day? Plus they've got all these people looking at them in the store waiting to be served."

She said the situation was worsened by the lack of information on when kits would arrive.

"I don't know when that's going to be - the wholesalers and other suppliers can't give us an exact date," she said.

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Ms Zordan said it was just the latest frustration in a two-year-long battle to keep up with growing demand and responsibilities.

"It's always just thrown to pharmacies and thrown out there to the community that pharmacies do this that and the other, but for one, we couldn't get the vaccines when we wanted to and we're still restricted with how many we can get and now with the RATs they're saying everyone can have one, but pharmacies can't get any - it's very frustrating," she said.

"They just chuck it on pharmacies. Doctors were closing over COVID and the message was 'don't come to the doctor when you're sick, but go to your local pharmacy to see your pharmacist'. So bring the COVID there because they don't matter.'

"You can just go to pharmacy and we're just the end of the chain more or less. Poor pharmacists are treated like they're not a professional which is really disappointing because we give a lot to the community."

Ms Zordan said she felt her profession was not given the respect or support it deserved.

"We're always at the end," she said.

"What used to get me was they used to have on the TV all the essential businesses which were open and pharmacies were always after bottle shops.

"We were always at the very bottom, it was bottle shops, supermarkets then pharmacies were at the bottom. It was just really insulting and we're here giving out free advice, if we're giving our RATs we're not getting much from the government for doing all the work and the amount of thousands of phone calls we're having, it's just insane.

"It's very difficult for pharmacy, the girls are just stretched to the max."

She said despite being frontline workers, pharmacy staff were not considered 'critical' according to the state government.

"They've changed a lot of isolation times for critical businesses and industries so the world can still continue but they haven't changed it for pharmacy which is not classed as critical," Ms Zordan said.

"So some pharmacies have had to close around Australia because they can't get pharmacists because they're either off with COVID or isolating because they've been around a positive case. They may not have it but they still have to isolate but other industries deemed important or essential, they wave that but we're not classed as that."

Ms Zordan said staff were often given little notice of major changes to health advice.

"With the vaccinations - we were really restricted with what we could get at the start of the year, we could only put in an order every two weeks," she said.

"So you estimate how many you're going to use, and I don't want heaps of wastage, so they didn't actually tell the pharmacy a month ahead of time that they're going to bring out people have to have a booster within four months.

"Maybe it's a good idea to give us some feedback so we know we need to order more to have it here so of course I didn't have more. So there were all these people ringing but I couldn't do it because I couldn't get vaccines because they only let us order every fortnight.

"We only have one vaccinator and not here every day. I think the other pharmacies have one there every day but then they've still got all their other work they need to do and we can't just stand there vaccinating all day everyday like the government think we can do, it's still a hugely busy store with everything else."

She said vaccine supply was fickle.

"I still haven't received paediatric vaccines, I ordered them a week ago," she said.

"I'm hoping to get them this week. I'm not placing bookings until I've got the vaccines. One other time I placed a heap of bookings and the vaccines were delayed a week and I had to ring and cancel 50 people.

"I haven't got time to sit there for half an hour and cancel people because the government didn't get their act together and send them out quick enough."

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