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The US-Iran war was having a “very limited” impact on medicine shortages at the moment, but it would have a “bigger impact further down the line,” said Community Pharmacy England (CPE) committee member, Fin McCaul, at the Sigma conference in Leicester this month. 

Presenting work developed by CPE’s director of research and insights, James Davies, McCaul said that there were many reasons for shortages, including increased demand for medicines such as Ozempic and Mounjaro, and the 'Davina effect' on HRT treatments. But there were also manufacturing issues, supply issues, regulatory changes, globalisation, and the effect of low tariff prices in the UK.  

There were four key areas to consider: immediate supplies, logistics, raw materials, and digital warfare.

As a result of the US/Iran war “very few ships have left the Strait of Hormuz”, but this had not yet had much impact on the supply of medicines. However, it had affected the supply of petrochemicals, which in turn affected the production of some drugs, such as metformin and paracetamol, as well as packaging, and transportation for some cancer drugs, and a shortage of propylene which is used for ibuprofen. It was a “very complex picture” he said. 

In addition, air freight had been affected significantly when the war started and had yet to pick up, and overall, transportation costs had increased substantiality and that was "unsustainable" for distributors.

In terms of medicines manufacture, shortages of propane gas and LPG gas in India was a “critical factor” as this is where a “significant amount of all drugs” were made for the UK. However, raw materials he said was “probably the “biggest problem” yet to be faced as this would be "three to four months down the line". 

The other consideration was digital warfare. A US medical company had suffered an attack as a result of the war, which disrupted its ability to distribute its products in the UK. McCaul urged pharmacy owners to consider the security of their digital environment and how well trained the teams were on preventing digital disruption.