Prescription charges to be abolished for people with long-term conditions

Arthritis Care welcomes the Government's decision that prescription charges will be abolished for people with long-term conditions.

The plans, announced by Gordon Brown at Labour's autumn conference, will see people with cancer receiving free prescriptions from next year followed later by people with other long-term conditions.

Arthritis Care has been part of a coalition of organisations campaigning on this issue. The coalition set out to ensure that no person would be denied access to their medication because of cost. This announcement goes a significant way to ensuring this does not happen. 

The Prime Minister announced that free prescriptions will be extended to people with long-term conditions only when the benefits of cost-saving programmes have been realised. Arthritis Care hopes that this does not cause undue delay in the introduction of this important and long-awaited measure.