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Brits who use popular medicines like Calpol, Lemsip and Gaviscon given urgent warning by chemists

Home> News

Published 14:57 27 Mar 2023 GMT+1

Brits who use popular medicines like Calpol, Lemsip and Gaviscon given urgent warning by chemists

Pharmacies are struggling to get supplies of common medications such as Calpol, Lemsip, and Gaviscon

Tom Wood

Tom Wood

Stocks of home-use medicines such as Gaviscon, Lemsip, and Calpol are running low across the UK, with pharmacies struggling to keep the products in.

Chemists are reportedly struggling to keep supplies of ordinary over-the-counter children’s painkillers such as Calpol, with difficulty getting ingredients in from China thought to be at least partially responsible.

Other factors such as high-levels of Covid-19 and flu this winter are also thought to be somewhat to blame.

The chief executive of the Association for Multiple Pharmacies, Dr Layla Hannbeck, also said that Gaviscon and Lemsip might be more difficult to get hold of as well.

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Lemsip could be in short supply.
Lemsip

She told the MailOnline: “Supplies of liquid paracetamol and ibuprofen, which are given to children to ease pain, are very low indeed.

"Pharmacists are spending a lot of time trying to ensure we get drips of medicines coming through – at least one variant of each – so patients are not left completely high and dry.

“It's not just children's painkillers that are affected – it's a range of other very common medicines including Sterimar congestion relief nasal spray for babies, Lemsip, Gaviscon, Optrex and [constipation treatment] Senokot.”

However, despite the fact that stocks are running low and the medicines are harder to get, there’s no need to panic buy or hoard products and ‘no need to be concerned’.

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You can only take a limited number of these medicines in a day anyway, so there's definitely no call to go out and buy about 10 packets of each.

Another contributing factor to this could be that there’s simple been a higher demand for these products in the year so far because of seasonal illnesses.

Gaviscon and other over-the-counter medications might be difficult to get as well.
Gaviscon

Hannbeck continued: “The demand has been high because this season we’ve seen higher cases of colds and flu and people are obviously trying very hard to look after themselves and making sure that they use the relevant products to manage the symptoms.

"And that has led to a shortage of these products in terms of us not being able to obtain them."

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We were warned about this potential shortage earlier in the year by the UK Health Security Agency, who cited increased levels of flu and Covid-19 this winter as a factor.

A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “We know how distressing and frustrating medicine supply issues can be, but we want to assure people we have well-established processes with an aim to prevent supply issues occurring in the first instance, and to manage or mitigate them when they occur.

“We work with a wide range of organisations operating in the UK medicine supply chain to provide advice and help ensure that patients continue to have access to safe and effective treatments.”

Despite the potential shortages, there's no need to panic buy or over-stock.
Calpol

Remember though, there is no need to panic, no need to hoard, no need to do anything silly.

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Summer is on the way, too – hopefully that means that we’ll start to see less of the seasonal illnesses that have caused the shortage, then things can get back to normal.

Featured Image Credit: J Hayward / Christine Whitehead / Alamy

Topics: UK News, Health, Science

Tom Wood
Tom Wood

Tom Wood is a LADbible journalist and Twin Peaks enthusiast. Despite having a career in football cut short by a chronic lack of talent, he managed to obtain degrees from both the University of London and Salford. According to his French teacher, at the weekend he mostly likes to play football and go to the park with his brother. Contact Tom on [email protected]

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@TPWagwim

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