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Global pharmacy workforce to grow 40% by 2030

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Global pharmacy workforce to grow 40% by 2030

New FIP workforce report

The global pharmacy workforce continues to grow and on current trends will be 40 per cent larger in 2030 than in 2016, a report from the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) predicts.

The report, titled Pharmacy workforce intelligence: Global trends, was published at the FIP Congress in Glasgow on Tuesday 4 September. The authors collected workforce data from FIP member organisations in up to 75 countries between 2006 and 2016 and analysed this for trends.

The number of pharmacists per 10,000 people in the population has grown over that period, the authors say, with the highest absolute changes in capacity seen in the Eastern Mediterranean and Europe regions.

Growth appears to be slowest in low-income countries, and the report authors warn of a “widening income-based capacity gap”.

Other trends

In other trends, the report finds that the proportion of women making up the pharmacy workforce continues to increase steadily, growing by around 7.5 per cent each decade. The authors predict that by 2030, 72 per cent of the global pharmacy workforce will be women.

Lead author professor Ian Bates commented that this shift in gender patterns “will have complex implications for health workforce planners – which will include a hard look at gender equity issues in addition to a greater professional and economic focus on how we support ‘return to practice’ after career breaks”.

The authors say there is a “pressing need for further focused analysis” of capacity trends with regard to region, gender, practice sectors and other factors. FIP will continue to monitor and assess the global pharmacy workforce, co-author Dr Lina Bader said.

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