Page 13 - Pharmacy History 33 November 2007

John Hood.
business, seconded the motion to
have a select committee consider the bill. In July 1857 when the select committee report was presented there was a different feeling. Mr Hood had strong objections to the restrictions on the practice of chemists and druggists, especially the proposed regulation
of Dover’s Powders, which was commonly used for infant teething. Under the proposed Bill, because it contained opium, the supply was to
be restricted to the prescription of a qualified medical practitioner. This and other restrictions on the practice of the chemist and druggist were to the advantage of the medical practitioner. An organisation of pharmaceutical chemists, all originally from Great Britain and including Mr Hood, MLC, had formed in 1857 to petition against Dr Tierney’s bill. This group, the Pharmaceutical Society of Victoria, presented a petition to the House
on 21 July and as a result, the Bill
was allowed to ‘lie on the table.’ It
was 20 years before another Bill was presented.
A major reason for the tension between the parties interested in Embling and Tierney’s bill was the developments in the medical professions. The tension between the physicians, surgeons
and pharmaceutical chemists can be illustrated by an incident recorded
in the Ballarat Star newspaper, 18 August 1859, cited by Anthea Hyslop in Sovereign Remedies. The British hierarchy was evident in Australia with the university-trained physicians,
the apprentice-trained surgeons and apprentice-trained apothecaries. The newspaper reported an incident where two surgeons were insulted by Mr Usher, the pharmaceutical chemist and house steward of the Ballarat Hospital, who had suggested that “apothecaries were as well educated as fellows of
the College of Surgeons and that
in very many instances the surgeon was the creature of the apothecary”. Newspaper advertisements from the time show that medical practitioners, such as George Wakefield, often prepared their own prescriptions and had a shop attached to their practice There was not the clear division of practice that eventually developed. Physicians were able to charge a fee for medical advice and either dispense a prescription or send the patients to a pharmaceutical chemist to have their medicine dispensed. Pharmaceutical chemists also gave medical advice without charge, as long as this
was done in the ‘open shop’, they sometimes had a surgeon in attendance in their shop and some pharmaceutical chemists pulled teeth. A number
of pharmaceutical chemists also manufactured proprietary products and had a wholesale department,
in both Ballarat and Melbourne.
The overlap in services offered was often unclear and a source of rivalry,
as indicated by remarks from the Pharmaceutical Society, reported in
the Argus 1857, suggesting that Dr Tierney’s Bill describes “crude and unnecessary measures” designed
to affect the “material interest” of pharmaceutical chemists.
Medical practitioners in Victoria
had successfully followed the lead
of Great Britain and in 1862 the
first Medical Practitioner’s Act was passed. This regulated the required qualifications and registration of medical practitioners and protected their right to practice. In 1870 the Medical Society attempted to move into what was seem as chemists’ territory when they proposed legislation to regulate education and training for pharmaceutical chemists. This came about because an accidental poisoning of a patient as a result of a physician ordering an overdose not picked up by the dispensing chemist.
The Age reported that the chemists and druggists were not interested in regulations, “until the Medical Society had come to a resolution that the medical profession should take steps to ensure the passing of a Pharmacy Bill into law”. The Editorial suggested that, as no progress had been made with legislation, “the necessity for change could not have been felt to
be overwhelming” and that it was “questionable if the evils which are said to exist are anything like so great as appears to heave been taken for granted.” This suggests that the public may not have been as anxious as the medical profession for the drugs and poisons regulations.
Pharmacists realised that the Pharmaceutical Society alone was unable to protect the profession
and that there needed to be similar regulations regarding academic qualifications and registration. Joseph Bosisto, MLA, a Melbourne pharmaceutical chemist and member of the Pharmaceutical Society, in presenting the Pharmacy Bill to Parliament in August 1876 said – “It seems to me that in these days of educational progress and sanitary reform, it is absolutely necessary
that every department of the science which affects the lives and health of the community should be brought under legislative enactment.” Bosisto referred to similar bills in Europe and United States as precedents.
volume 4 ■ no 34 ■ February 2008
Pharmacy History Australia ■ 13
Joseph Bosisto