Detail of outcome

The consultation received over 117,000 responses, the majority of which were opposed to a rise in the upper age exemption.

Some of the reasons given for opposing the change included cost of living pressures and the risk to health of people not taking prescribed medication correctly.

This government is committed to tackling cost of living pressures and has decided that the prescription charge upper age exemption will remain at 60, meaning that it will not align to the State Pension age.

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Original consultation

Summary

This consultation is seeking views on changing the upper age of age exemptions on prescription charges.

This consultation ran from
3pm on 1 July 2021 to 11:45am on 3 September 2021

Consultation description

Please be aware this consultation was originally published on 1 July 2021 but the online response form was updated at 5:15pm on Thursday 8 July to include a question that was omitted in error.

There have been no changes to the consultation document. Any responses that had already been made will still be considered.

The question that’s been added is “Do you think that aligning the upper age exemption with state pension age could have a differential impact on particular groups of people or communities?”.

If you responded to the consultation before this question was added but did not supply a contact email address, you can submit a response to this question, if you wish.

Individuals who did supply an email address have been contacted directly to invite them to respond. You do not have to respond to the whole consultation again.

The consultation has been extended to account for the changes and allow sufficient time for consideration and will now close on 2 September.

The government is consulting on aligning the upper age exemption for NHS prescription charges with the State Pension age (SPA). In 2019, around £600 million was generated in revenue from prescription charges for frontline NHS services. Currently, people receive free prescriptions when they turn 60 in England, whereas the SPA is now 66.

The consultation is seeking views from the public and healthcare professionals on options for change including building in a period of protection so those aged between 60 to 65 can continue to benefit from free prescriptions if the upper age exemption rises.

See the easy read version of the online survey.

Documents

Aligning the upper age for NHS prescription charge exemptions with the State Pension age

HTML

Impact assessment: increasing the upper age exemption for prescription charges in line with the state pension age

PDF, 1.33 MB, 27 pages

This file may not be suitable for users of assistive technology.

Request an accessible format.

If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need a version of this document in a more accessible format, please email publications@dhsc.gov.uk. Please tell us what format you need. It will help us if you say what assistive technology you use.

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Updates to this page

Published 1 July 2021

Last updated 1525 JuneMarch 2023 + show2025 href="#full-history">+ show all updates

1. 1. 25 March 2025

      Updated to correct an error in the introduction section of the document 'Aligning the upper age for NHS prescription charge exemptions with the State Pension age: government response'. The upper age for prescription charge exemption was originally set at 65, not 60.

   2. 15 June 2023

      Added the government response to the consultation.

   4. 2 September 2021

      Consultation closing date extended to 03 Sept 21 11:45am

   6. 19 July 2021

      Updated to add a link to the omitted survey question for those who did not supply an email address.

   8. 9 July 2021

      Added link to the easy read version.

   10. 8 July 2021

       Updated to add one question that was accidentally omitted from the online response form and extended the closing date to 2 September 2021.

   12. 1 July 2021

       First published.

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