Dear American Medical Association: It’s about Public Health not a Turf War.

Dr. Scott Knoer, PharmD is the CEO of the American Pharmacists Association. Scott has been very vocal about the FDA eliminating barriers to Pharmacists prescribing COVID antivirals and how the American Medical Association (AMA) seeming to be more concerned with their 'turf' and political position compared to the benefit to public health within America. Amesh Adalja, MD wrote in MedPage Today, an article titled: "A Successful 'Test-to-Treat' Program Requires All Hands on Deck" Within the article, Dr. Adalja wrote. In encouraging news, President Biden just announced a new plan to increase faster access: test-to-treat. The plan will enable pharmacies to become one-stop shops for COVID-19 diagnosis and oral antiviral treatment. Having treatment available at the point-of-diagnosis has the potential to significantly improve prescribing rates, which will have the downstream impact of reducing hospitalizations. More sick patients will quickly be able to access treatment. "We can't have a guild-like mentality that seeks to use government force to exclude qualified persons from engaging in a field for which the AMA wants physicians to be the exclusive purveyors. This has been evident in organized medicine's general opposition to expanded practice scopes for nurse practitioners, physician assistants, psychologists, and -- as is clear -- pharmacists. It's bad enough to advocate for this on a day-to-day basis. To do so during a public health emergency, where all hands are needed on deck, is destructive." -- Amesh Adalja, MD  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices