To think blanket free prescriptions for over 60s NEED to end?

[Idratherbepaddleboarding]

I know this will be controversial but I popped to the doctors in my lunch break to collect my prescription and joined a longish queue. Everyone in front of me was over 60 and collecting huge bags of medications and I was the only one paying for any of it.

I don’t dispute that I should have to pay but often I can’t afford it which has led to me having to miss days of my medication, leaving me feeling very emotional and at times suicidal (medication is for depression). Perhaps if everyone who has over a certain income had to pay, they’d be able to lower the prescription charge for everyone or be able to afford the pay rises they say they can’t afford for nurses and junior doctors.

The killer was that every single one of the people in front of me got back into massive, brand new SUVs, one couple into a Range Rover and another into a Jaguar. If they can afford to own (and run!) cars like that, paying for a prescription would be a drop in the ocean for them. AIBU to think that free prescriptions should be limited to those in pension credit just like Universal Credit?

When DH’s grandad died, his mum and auntie shared out his collection of prescription paracetamol and ibuprofen (I know they should be returned to the pharmacy but they’d only have been destroyed and both are ex nurses so I guess they know what they’re doing). I’m not joking, there were boxes and boxes of the stuff, we didn’t buy painkillers for years and these will have cost the NHS a lot more than they would from the supermarket and weren’t even taken by the person that they were intended for! Surely paracetamol and ibuprofen should not be available on the NHS at all?

I really don’t want to bash the over 60s and it wouldn’t be a vote winner for politicians but surely we can’t afford to keep free prescriptions for those that can afford them?

These things are entirely affordable and contribute to economic growth in our society.

How do you fund it though against a backdrop of a huge population demographic shift, wage stagnation for decades & house prices inflation?

Noooo, you have misunderstood - the NHS is so vital to our nation's economic health - we need increased government funding into the NHS, to ensure healthier opulation, to improve the workforce, to imporve growth, to make us all richer.

Cutting back on health care will make our downward economic spiral worse.

Does the nhs still hand out free powdered baby milk…!? When did they do that? Not when I was bringing mine up 35 years ago.

It's high. The majority of people are paid less than that

@MereDintofPandiculation

Just because salaries have stagnated doesn't mean inflation hasn't devalued money...

I do agree as a working person struggling to live. I won't have the luxury of free prescriptions when I retire (probably the 75). So why should I fund it now when I know I won't get anything?!

You get healthy start vouchers now to get your baby milk from supermarkets

Growth. Invest to grow. Create jobs. Increased productivity.

The population demographic shift creates a healthcare need - they need care - care is work - work is wages - wages is purchasing - growth.

Cuts cuts cuts = national poverty death spiral. You can not cut your way to economic growth.

What gets me is Scotland not paying for prescriptions at all…..funded by the English taxpayer (same with uni fees)

Any one or all of those people in front of you could have been on mobility which enables you to get a new car. You have no idea.

It's the higher rate tax threshold. Only 13% of taxpayers had incomes over £50k, so by that metric it's a pretty high threshold - well within the upper quartile.

It seems everyone wants wants absolute financial equality.

Everyone has the same
No one is better off than their neighbour
Means testing everything and taking away hard earned benefits ( pension, bus, prescription etc ) means the Govn has total control over everyone’s ability to better themselves
Attitudes brought on by jealousy are leading to a desire for a Communist society ….maybe some people would be happier in North Korea.

If you means test something which 90% of people are going to get free, then the means testing really is going to cost you more than giving whatever it is free to the last 10%. So the comparison with prices is irrelevant here.

It is absolutely not high.

Your perspective may be skewed by your own low wages but you have to recognise inflation on prices. You need £75k now to feel as rich as you felt earning £50k when the child benefit policy (which was wrong anyway) was introduced.

MIL gave up work in her 20's to raise two DC and never returned again. She's 82 now on a shed load of stuff. Hundreds of thousands of women of that generation just like her.
No need to means test, just make some sort of cut off/blanket rule like they did when they changed the eligibility for child benefit a few years back. That was implemented quickly and easily enough.

I had mine in 2000 and 2004.
I breastfed but at weighing in at our surgery there was free powdered milk for anyone that wanted it.

How many times - the tax threshold has been FROZEN while prices have RISEN.

The Daily Mail reading trolls are out in force today!

The great benefit of free bus passes is they give people who are mostly retired an incentive to do their public transport use after the morning rush hour. Means testing is expensive and doesn't necessarily save money overall anyway, but even if it did with bus passes that's one benefit I wouldn't mind the state pot subsidising a bit.

And that's another costly travesty. Our neighbours have a BMW and a Merc for their own cars, and use their DLA money for a "fun" motability car, which is currently a bright yellow Mini. They openly admit they don't need the car and don't need the money, but they get a "fun" car "because they can".

That didn't happen, did it? There is no way the average high street pharmacy just happens to have empty parking spaces for all its customers right outside its doors, nor did it serve all the customers plus you so quickly that you could see the people in front of you getting into their cars when you left.

Nor, of course, do you even know whether they were in their own cars as opposed to being given lifts.

It’s a difficult one, very few people under 60 qualify for free prescriptions. Yet say someone with severe asthma doesn’t get them free. My DH has type 2 diabetes so gets all his prescriptions free. I had countless prescriptions last year and I always buy a pre paid certificate I worked out I saved over £900 last year.

It would be better if they prescribed more than 4 weeks at a time. When I get my medication from the hospital I get enough for three months and it would cost the same for 4 weeks worth.

I think it’s a real minefield on who should get free prescriptions.

Yes, and how many times does it have to be said that the vast majority of people have incomes under £50k. Those with higher incomes need to start understanding they need to pay more tax and/or receive less benefits as the numbers simply don't stack up and we can't keep taxing the lower earners more and more.

I am one of the folk in their sixties with a decent car who collects prescriptions quite regularly for a condition I have. I would be only too happy to pay for my medication if it meant others might have theirs free if they can't afford it. I know that sounds smug and virtue signalling perhaps but it's true. It's just practical in my view - if I can pay and others can't, why on earth shouldn't I pay?

The NHS would collapse within a day!

No they don't. Whats with MN these days, people looking for benefits/perks that working class people shouldn't get? Over 60s to in the main have worked all their lives, what do you think would've happened to next generation if they hadn't? God forbid they get any perks. All this envy and schadenfreude nonsense is partly why the more cruel the Tories are, the more votes they get.