In England, a pharmacy industry group says large amounts of partly used medicines are being discarded each year. The National Pharmacy Association (NPA) estimates that 3,400 tonnes of medicines are disposed of in 2024/25—equivalent, the group says, to filling 75 Olympic-size swimming pools.
The NPA frames the issue as a growing problem and calls for action to reduce avoidable waste. It argues that more regular reviews of repeat prescriptions could help prevent patients from accumulating medicines they no longer need. Across the coverage, the focus is on the scale of disposal and the potential financial impact, with estimates cited for the NHS cost of wasted medicines.
Outlets largely rely on the same NPA figures, using the swimming-pool comparison and the estimated annual cost to illustrate the extent of waste. Differences are mainly in emphasis—some highlight the resource and space analogy, while others foreground the NHS cost estimate—rather than in the underlying numbers attributed to the NPA.
