A pharmacy which allowed a shop assistant to sell a non-prescription painkiller tablet had a charge against it struck out yesterday after the judge described the prosecution as "bureaucracy gone mad".
A second pharmacy which allowed a student technician rather than a qualified chemist to sell medicines was fined €100 and ordered to pay €900 in costs.
The two cases were taken by the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland (PSI) for failure to have a qualified pharmacist carry out the transactions. Springfield Medicare Ltd, Alderwood Court, Tallaght, Dublin, and SOS Health Care Ltd, Darndale Village, Dublin, both pleaded guilty.
Dublin District Court heard that a PSI inspector called to Springfield Medicare last May and bought a packet of Neurophen tablets. The person who sold them had said that she was a student pharmaceutical technician and that the pharmacist was not available.
The inspector also got two prescription drugs, Augmentin and Distaclor, from the same pharmacy. The court heard that the amount dispensed was for five days, a day in excess of the recommended period for such drugs.
The pharmacy's solicitor, Mr Michael Staines, said that the owner had got an urgent call to return to the country of his origin, Nigeria, and had arranged for a locum, but was "let down". He subsequently wrote a letter to the PSI, explaining what had happened, and apologised.
Judge Gerard Haughton imposed a fine of €100 with €900 costs.
In the case against SOS Health Care, however, Judge Haughton said that the prosecution was a "waste of time".
The court heard that a shop assistant had sold a 24-tablet packet of Neurophen to an inspector, but this happened while the pharmacist had stepped out to his car for a few minutes. The court also heard that because the pharmacy had been in existence for less than three years, the pharmacist involved may not have been entitled to sell the drug even if he had been there.
Judge Haughton said that while the prosecution was understandable if there had been no pharmacist there for the whole day, it was accepted that he had stepped out for a few minutes. "In my view, this is bureaucracy gone mad. I think it's outrageous. The fact that the pharmacist would be qualified to work if he was in an older premises is even more bureaucracy." He dismissed the charge under the Probation Act.