Seasons Greetings '

Seasons Greetings
’

Festive Message 2014

Dear Colleagues and Friends

Life goes by so very fast, colleagues, and taking the time to reflect, even once a year, slows things down. We zoom past so many seconds, minutes, hours, with the frantic way we live that it’s important we take at least time to stop, take stock, and acknowledge our place in time before diving back into the frenzy of our daily lives! 2014 has gone, like the ones before it … in a flash! The profession has had some challenges as it will always have and the secret is to look at it from the perspective of opportunities and chances that await us!
Many things are thrown our way in this game of life. How you deal with them shows your true character. I hope that all of you to feel the hope and passion I feel for the upcoming year. I want ALL of you to not only go for your dreams, but have a good time doing it!
On behalf of CPS, I would like to wish all of you that have the privilege of having a break over the Christmas season a peaceful and joyful time relieved of your rushed life and busy schedules. It was again a year that was full of opportunities, which has just flown past. We need to sit down and reflect on work of the past year.
I sincerely hope that you all have met the goals set out for this year and will be prosperous in 2015 and be able to utilise all the opportunities coming your way. Christmas is a very precious time to spend and enjoy with family and friends. I trust that the message and joy of Christmas will have a special meaning to you all and wish you all the best for 2015.
I want to express my gratitude and give recognition to all my colleagues who have put valuable time and effort into the profession and for assisting me in

getting the work of CPS done.

I wish all of you who are celebrating religious days

that they are blessed and for those that are fortunate enough to go on holiday, travel safely and come back refreshed and energised so that we can show the world what pharmacy is about in 2015!
To quote TS Elliot…
KOBUS LE ROUX

President CPS

Dear Friends and Colleagues

‘For last year’s words belong to last year’s language And next year’s words await another voice. And to make an end is to make a beginning.’ JOHANN KRUGER
As another year comes to a close we may ponder all that went by. Some tasks were accomplished and others not but we still have opportunities that may well be converted into achievements in 2015. I would like to take this opportunity to wish you one and all a blessed and joyful festive season.

President PSSA

If you are going to be travelling at this time, may you return home safely.

Dear Friends and Colleagues

Once again we have to come to the end of the year with so much that we still wanted to do. Though there might have been some lows, the good is what we will take forward from this year and build the future on. A lot of progress in the pharmacy profession has been made in 2014 and much good work has been completed. For this we give our praise to the Almighty and thank our families, friends and colleagues for their support and tireless work. May we all experience a peaceful and joyous festive season and come back in 2015 with renewed vigour to convert all our opportunities and challenges into achievements.
DONALD BLACK

Chairman CPS (CWP) Branch

Greetings to you all!

It has indeed been a busy time for everyone!
2014 saw the implementation of the complementary medicines regulations which impacts not only the industry sector but also the community sector and even health shops.
As we fast approach the summer season and the long summer days in the Cape, may you all have time to take a deep breath, smell the beautiful roses and take time out to recharge those batteries.
Be safe with your loved ones and have safe travels. Come back refreshed for a new year. Season greetings!
SAREL MALAN

Chairman PSSA CWP Branch

AADILA PATEL

SAAPI

SEASON’S GREETINGS continued
As the year rushes towards its end I find that time

is more than ever one of my most valuable and scarcest commodities. I wish there were raw ingredients or a stockpile somewhere from which I could dispense, import, withdraw, forage, manufacture or even perhaps grow more time (I’ll even make it organic!). This of course makes me reflect on how well I spent this precious commodity throughout the year when there somehow seemed to be more of it going around. Did I make the most of every second, minute and hour? Did I use it for good? How well did I distribute it between the important facets of my life and that of others around me, and did I get that ever important balance right? I hope that most of you can answer yes to majority of these questions, but if not I wish for you a 2015 in which you take a little time to make more time to spend time wisely.
To all the PSSA, and especially our SAAHIP members, may you have a blessed Festive Season filled with joy and loved ones.
To our members who celebrate Christmas – may you rejoice in the love of the Lord as you celebrate the birth of his Son.
Best wishes (and time well spent) to all SHANI DAMES

SAAHIP Chair

NOTICE OF AN ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

Notice is hereby given of the combined Annual General Meeting of the Cape Western Province Branch of the Pharmaceutical Society of South Africa and the Community Pharmacist Sector (CWP) Branch

to be held at Pharmacy House, ‘S’Block, Greenford Oﬃce Estate, Punters Way, Kenilworth

on Wednesday, 4 February 2015

at 7:00 pm for 8:00 pm The meeting will be preceded by a ﬁnger supper. Wives, husbands and partners are most welcome, but to facilitate catering,

kindly RSVP by Friday 30 January 2015 ELIZE/PAM – TELEPHONE 021 683 7313

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ KENNISGEWING VAN ’N ALGEMENE JAARVERGADERING

Hiermee word kennis gegee van die gekombineerde Algemene Jaarvergadering van die Kaap Westelike Provinsie Tak van die Aptekersvereniging van Suid-Afrika en die Gemeenskapsaptekers Sektor (KWP) Tak

wat gehou sal word te Farmasiehuis, ‘S’Block, Greenford Oﬃce Estate, Puntersweg, Kenilworth

op Woensdag, 4 Februarie 2015

om 7:00 nm vir 8:00 nm Die vergadering sal deur ’n vinger ete voorafgegaan word. Gades en metgeselle is baie welkom, maar om verversings te voorsien sal ’n antwoord waardeer word.

RSVP teen Vrydag, 30 Januarie 2015 ELIZE/PAM – TELEFOON 021 683 7313

Editorial Bill Bannatyne

The William Paterson Award – an appreciation and some comments

As I was not given an opportunity to speak when I received the William Paterson Award, I would like to make use of The Tincture Press to record my appreciation for the presentation and to add some comments.
In the first instance, I would like to record my thanks and appreciation to Dr Finkelstein and some other CWP committee members whom I understand battled for some considerable time to get the award reinstated. The PSSA national executive had considered it to be an unnecessary addition to the PSSA awards. I only became aware of the award and the effort that had been made to reinstate it when I received a telephone call from the PSSA president, Johann Kruger, who informed me that I was to be presented with the Paterson Award. Further, I am indebted to Dr Finkelstein for the very detailed presentation which he made as a motion to the PSSA AGM. It must have involved a considerable amount of research. He recorded some details of my career which I had forgotten about.
I have received many awards from the PSSA all of which are appreciated and valued. However, I believe that the greatest award that I have received is that I got to know, served with and on committees led by some of the very great men who, over the years, have made the PSSA the premier organisation that it is today. Had I not been involved, they would have been the soon forgotten names and occasional SAPJ photographs, equally forgotten. persuaded the committee to create a completely unconstitutional position of honorary minute secretary, a position which I held for several years.
It was on this committee that I first met one of the very real gentlemen of pharmacy, Harold Zets. Harold was the leading member of the committee, a past chairman and treasurer of the Pharmacy Board. I valued his friendship.

The Pinelands Pharmacists

When I married, my wife and I settled in South Africa’s first Garden City, Pinelands, quite close to Hymie Barnett’s pharmacy and a little further away from that of Ellie Shifrin, who, for many years, was the branch secretary. Hymie and I used to travel together to PSSA meetings during which I would be regaled, in his inimitable style, with stories and anecdotes of the PSSA. One of my daughters, also a pharmacist, Susan Joubert, did her internship at Barnett’s Pharmacy and told me that he was not only a very good pharmacist but also a very good businessman.
At this stage I became a long time friend with another pharmacist from Pinelands, Gus Muller. Gus, a self made man, very down to earth, was the type of person who would always come to the fore when problems arose and would put us back on course with his very realistic and practical solutions. Another Pineland’s pharmacist whose meteoric career I was witness to was Johan van der Walt. One of the three wholesalers in Cape Town was Petersens whose wholesale and manufacturing plant was situated in the centre of Cape Town. Some of their buildings were built in the nineteenth century.
They decided to build a new wholesale and manufacturing plant at Gunner’s Circle. We were informed that a pharmacist from Potchefstroom was coming to the city to run this new development. Johan arrived, was immediately elected to the branch committee; then, at the first national AGM, onto the PSSA national executive and later the Pharmacy Board; a sojourn out of pharmacy into the chemical industry and back to pharmacy as head of SAD and president of the Pharmacy Board. I always admired Johan’s

Early days in the profession

When I started my three-year apprenticeship at Bill James’ pharmacy in Wynberg, a few years after WW2, there were three other pharmacies, all within a hundred metres or so. Symptomatic with those days, they all worked in harmony, each with his separate clientele. The nearest pharmacy belonged to Max Rifkin, past chairman, long-time honorary treasurer of the branch and friend of Bill James. I only joined the PSSA nearly 10 years after I qualified as nobody had asked me to join. Max was responsible for getting me elected to the branch committee and when I did not get the vote in the following year, he

EDITORIAL continued

expertise in summing up a debate which was getting nowhere and bringing it to a final unanimous decision. I also was impressed with his ability in public speaking to switch languages in mid sentence without a single fault in syntax.
They always sought potential future leaders amongst their members, nurtured and cultivated them and at the appropriate time projected them into the national executive and often into the presidency. Ray Pogir, a future president of the PSSA, a great negotiator and diplomat, was one of their candidates. He originated and motivated the campaign which started the PSSA’s anti-drug abuse campaign.
Carl Schnell and I attended our first meeting as members of the Pharmacy Board when Peter Donnelly was elected as president. It was the only meeting of the Board which he chaired as he was killed in a boating accident a few months later. He was a remarkably well-informed and experienced pharmacist. He was not lacking in courage. He once publicly castigated a government sick fund which, by frequently calling for new bids for the exclusive right to dispense their members’ prescriptions, drove a pharmacist close to bankruptcy and being charged with fraud and having to appear before the Pharmacy Board. The sick fund threatened to sue Peter for libel but thought better of it and quietly forgot about the whole incident.

Interactions with Politicians

A pharmacist whom I served with for a number of years both on the PSSA national executive, the Pharmacy Board and its successor, the Pharmacy Council, was Graham Clark. I have often felt that many fellow pharmacists never quite fully realised, because of his apparent relaxed, carefree public image, just how influential and responsible he was for many of the developments and successes achieved by organised pharmacy in South Africa.
I recall being told how, immediately after a Pharmacy Council election, before the new council had actually met, he sought a personal interview with the then Minister of Health, Dr Schalk van der Merwe. The interview apparently went like this:
GRAHAM: ‘This newly elected council needs an industrial pharmacist as one of its members. Will you please appoint Hugo Snyckers.’
SCHALK: ‘He’s a Prog, isn’t he?’

Alan Walter, Cape Midlands Branch

GRAHAM: ‘So what?’

A pharmacist who our branch was closely associated

with was Alan Walter of the Cape Midlands branch. He was known as the ‘Benign Dictator of Port Elizabeth’. Actually he had no power at all and could have been out-voted at any time. What he did have was many innovative ideas which benefited his fellow pharmacists. These included a mutual wholesale, an after-hours service, a very efficient medical aid coordinating and checking office and a set of rules which made all these systems work to the benefit of the branch. His strength lay in an insistence that everyone obeyed the rules and those who did not lost out, regardless of their status or standing. He was a very good musician, fond of waterskiing and a connoisseur of quality clothing and vintage cars.
I recall one journey that Wally Arenson and I made to PE to explain some of the intricacies of the Local Authorities Medical Aid Fund to the Midlands Branch committee. As Alan was unable to attend the meeting and we had a few hours to spare we decided to visit his pharmacy to enlighten him about the fund. Our journey was interrupted when we passed a show window of Garlicks displaying ladies silk scarves. Wally decided, there and then, he had to buy one for his wife. In no time the Arenson charm was firing on all eight cylinders. He quickly had at least five salesladies in earnest discussion on which scarf he should buy. Half an hour later we progressed, together with Mrs Arenson’s scarf, to Alan’s
SCHALK: ‘I agree, so what. I will appoint him.’ On another occasion, I received a telephone call from Carl Schnell, Graham’s friend and supporter, informing me that he and Graham would be arriving, by air, in Cape Town, a few days later and requesting that I collect them at the bus terminal, take them to Parliament for a meeting and take them back to the airport after the meeting.
The meeting was held in Parliament, in what appeared to be a somewhat dark stairwell. There was no seating, standing room only. The audience was the entire membership of the Progressive Party in Parliament, including Helen Susman and Colin Eglin. They wanted to know what organised pharmacy’s policies and opinions were on a number of matters. Graham did most of the talking. I subsequently realised why the meeting had been arranged under these strange circumstances. The then Nationalist government had let the PSSA know, in no uncertain terms, that should they have any dealings with the opposition parties and, in particular, with Lawrence Wood, the only pharmacist in Parliament, the Society could expect no cooperation from the government.

Natal Coastal Branch

Graham was one of the leading lights in the Natal Coastal Branch of the Society. Whilst it was one of the smallest branches it was one of the most influential.

pharmacy which was another revelation. Alan had taken advantage of two separate disasters which had beset his pharmacy, a flood with water more than a metre deep and a fire which destroyed the building. He had redesigned the pharmacy which specialised in ranges of high-class cosmetics with a separate dispensary, which had a large one way mirror enabling those in the dispensary to see what was happening in the pharmacy but customers could not look into the dispensary. Upstairs, he had made provision for a very good filing system for prescriptions and all the other paraphernalia a pharmacy must keep. The only staff member was an elegant lady from the famed Port Elizabeth Chinese community. We waited for a few minutes for Alan who, finally, came striding out of the dispensary dressed in smart grey slacks, a white shirt and tie and, the pièce de résistance, a dark red waistcoat, in complete ambience with his up-market pharmacy. who did not know him, he could possibly have been mistaken for a Mafia godfather; he was one of the friendliest of men and one of our greatest members.

Ruby, Ray and others

I have written in the past about Ruby Birin being a man of contrasts, coupling very poor health with bulldog determination to get done and accepted what he felt should be done. Pharmacy was fortunate that Ruby and his predecessor, Ray Pogir, were at the helm of the PSSA when the Pharmacy Act came before Parliament in 1974. Ruby took his entire executive committee to Cape Town for one week. With assistance of the, until then, boycotted Lawrence Wood, who introduced them to members on both sides of the House, the PSSA was able to put their case, successfully, that community pharmacies should be owned only by pharmacists, thereby keeping the lay ownership caucus at bay for a quarter of a century.
I can write about many more pharmacists whom
I met and knew through the PSSA. Men like the very talented Alfred Radis, whose life, like Peter Donnelly’s was cut short before its time or the hard working Andre Sonnekus, the epitome of a good chairman or an old school friend, Norman Feitelberg who founded the Society for the History of Pharmacy. Radis’s contribution to the creation of DDU has never been acknowledged by the PSSA.
A few years later, at a meeting in Johannesburg, some years before he died, he made a very interesting comment to me which I have pondered on a number of occasions. He said that he had often wondered whether he had made a mistake by helping to keep too many small pharmacies in Port Elizabeth in existence.

Julius Israelsohn, bastion of pharmacy

I served on both the PSSA national executive and the Pharmacy Council when Julius Israelsohn was treasurer of both organisations and vice president of the Council. I have always seen Julius as being the bastion of pharmacy. He joined the profession at an older age than most pharmacists. His wife was already a pharmacist whilst he was engaged in another pursuit but he was probably the most enthusiastic pharmacist for the profession and the PSSA that I have ever met. He was a lifelong collector of pharmaceutical artefacts which he displayed regularly in his pharmacy. The collection formed the basis of the Gauteng’s Branch’s museum which has been described by a Pharmintercom gathering in South Africa as one of the best pharmacy museums in the world. He also had a very extensive pharmaceutical library. Because the early PSSA felt it was too expensive to have membership of FIP, Julius and Bennie Jacobson became members and attended the annual conferences at their own expense. Julius created a worldwide network of pharmacist friends which enabled him to get up-to-date information on pharmaceutical world developments whenever the PSSA was at a loss to know which way forward they should go. Benzie Joffe, possibly a little unfairly, gave him the nickname of ‘Big Julie’. Whilst in repose, for those

The CWP MediKredit team

I would be very much amiss, however, if I omitted both Gus Ferguson and Wendy Bloom. Without their efforts and industry in managing the CWP MediKredit office, the branch would, in today’s world, be the poor cousins of the PSSA, existing on handouts. In 1979 when Alfred Radis suddenly died, Gus Muller stepped into the breach as Alfred was scheduled to be the next branch chairman. Gus was elected as chairman and asked me to take on the position of treasurer. This meant I was the member responsible for the MediKredit office. By the time this materialised, I found I had inherited an organisation in chaos. The ever-increasing number of medical aid contracts coupled with an office staff of pensioners, fixed in their ways, had resulted in the creation of an ever-increasing backlog and a failure to keep up with payments to the participating pharmacies. This created a cash flow problem for many pharmacies whose prime activities were medical aid dispensing. I spent several days with the pensioner in charge of the daily running of the office, identified the areas which were delaying the through flow of the checking and reached an agreed plan of action with him. When I returned two days later to find

out how far the rescue plan had progressed, I was coolly informed that after I had left, a meeting of the staff had rejected the plan and decided to carry on exactly as before. I obtained permission from Gus Muller to seek the help of the MediKredit head office in Johannesburg to take over our branch’s work and close our office down.

William Paterson, the man

In conclusion, at last, I think a few sentences about William Paterson are indicated. He was still active when I attended my first national PSSA AGMs. A small, somewhat shy man, he was always interested in everything the Society was involved in. He was editor of the SAPJ from 1934 to 1946.
When I entered our branch office to set this in motion, I was confronted by Wendy Bloom. Looking me straight in the eye, without any preliminaries, she blurted, ‘If you pay these people, I will reorganise this office for you.’ Actually, she is much shorter than I am so she had to look up. The effect, however, was the same. A brilliant pharmacist from a brilliant family, she and Gus Ferguson, at that stage only the branch director, ran the office until the sale of MediKredit.
The branch share of the sale of MediKredit, coupled with the financial genius of Natie Finkelstein has placed the branch in a reasonably secure position to meet most of its obligations. Up until then, Wendy and her sister-in-law had been employed, sitting at a table just big enough to hold a small vase of flowers, to check the more difficult prescriptions. Gus, a world recognised poet and brilliant cartoonist amongst other things, and Wendy ran the office for years, without the trappings of private secretaries or company cars, with a friendly and cooperative staff, mostly ladies from the famous and historic Cape Malay suburb of Bo-Kaap. I was always fascinated to see a room full of veiled ladies industriously checking prescriptions. The last I heard of Wendy, she was apparently in India doing the practical section of an MBA course from Jerusalem University.
Probably one of his greatest contributions to the profession, in those days when over 95% of prescriptions had to be compounded by pharmacists from their basic ingredients, was a very scientifically researched dispensing tariff. This enabled a pharmacist, by merely locating the type of product and either its mass or volume, to obtain the recommended dispensing fee. The cost of ingredients was minimal and practically all fell within a very small bracket of cost. The pharmacist was therefore rewarded for his knowledge, skill and time. Mr. Paterson was very proud of the fact that during WW2 the government price controller had approved his tariff chart without comment. A probably totally untrue rumour was whispered around pharmacy that the price controller had, later, confessed to a friend that he had been visited by this small Scotsman who spoke in such a broad Scottish accent that he could not understand a single word that he was saying. He decided, however, that as Mr Paterson presented such an image of integrity, honesty and earnestness that whatever he was asking for must be in order so he approved it, notwithstanding!
Possibly, the current PSSA national executive committee might have erred in trying to cancel the William Paterson Award?‡