Greater progression across the pharmacy profession is needed in order to address challenges such as inequitable healthcare access, medicines shortages, antimicrobial resistance, and substandard and falsified medicines, Mr Paul Sinclair, President of the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP), said recently in his opening address at FIP’s 82nd World Congress of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences.
Mr Sinclair also highlighted a need for innovation in pharmacy to address public health challenges and disparities, citing pharmacy-based vaccination as an example of an innovative approach that has had high impact. He said: “Innovation is not just beneficial — it’s essential. Innovating pharmacy enhances patient care, improves therapeutic outcomes, addresses the dynamic challenges of healthcare, and propels the profession forward.”
The FIP President said that the application of three principles — integrity, performance and passion — would help facilitate the advancement of the profession. He explained:
“Integrity in our actions will help grow our reputation as accessible and reliable experts in medicines and as healthcare professionals, and will reinforce collaborations.
“Advancement of our profession to its full capability requires performance. This means consistently demonstrating expertise, commitment and ethical conduct in professional activities. It means applying best practices.”
“Our passion as pharmaceutical scientists, pharmacy educators and practitioners drives our advocacy work to expand our scopes of practice and to deliver the best possible health outcomes for our communities.”
Mr Sinclair said that FIP’s passion for pharmacy had led it to create its ‘Think Health, Think Pharmacy’ campaign to advance the profession, and urged pharmacists from around the world to support it. “Through this campaign, we’re raising awareness of the importance of pharmacies, and of pharmacists themselves, as an underutilised resource in the primary healthcare space, with the potential to deliver more for healthcare systems… We want everyone to think about pharmacy when they think about their health. We want policy-makers to think about universal pharmacy coverage when they think about universal health coverage. Promoting our professional identity will facilitate more pharmacy services with benefits for our communities,” he said.
