About 20 per cent of medicines are unnecessary and half are not taken properly, according to the chief pharmaceutical officer of NHS England GETTY IMAGESHigh street pharmacists will be sent out to care homes to end the “scandal” of older people taking too many pointless pills, the UK’s leading pharmacist has said. Hundreds of thousands of older people were hospitalised because of the side effects of drugs that they often did not need, said Keith Ridge, chief pharmaceutical officer of NHS England. Pharmacists needed to take more responsibility for reviewing medicines and earn respect by devoting less shop space to selling toiletries. Last week ministers said they would press ahead with cutting hundreds of millions of pounds from local pharmacies despite a petition signed…

Source: The Times October 28, 2016 23:05 UTC