From ‘Bespoke’ to ‘Off-the-Peg’: Community Pharmacists and the Retailing of Medicines in Great Britain 1900–1970

Abstract

This chapter begins with an account of the regulatory framework within which medicines were supplied during the twentieth century. It explores a wide range of legislation has had either a direct or indirect impact on the retailing of medicines. This included disease-specific legislation such as the Venereal Disease Act and the Cancer Act, and other legislation concerned with specific conditions such as epilepsy and consumption. The chapter focuses on the impact that the major drug discoveries of the twentieth century had on the retailing of medicines. It considers the emergence of the welfare state. The chapter also considers the social distinctions that were a common feature of the retailing of medicines both before and after introduction of the welfare state. It describes how the retail sale of the three main categories of retail medicines – home remedies, chemists' nostrums and proprietary medicines – waxed and waned during the twentieth century.

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