Spatial analysis of pharmacy access for older adults in Greater Melbourne
A spatial analysis of Greater Melbourne reveals that despite the presence of 393 distinct pharmacy service points, over half of the city's older adults lack walkable access to a community pharmacy, with significant disparities showing that inner suburbs are well-served while outer and peri-urban areas face pronounced "pharmacy deserts."
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
For millions of people, the community pharmacy is more than a place to pick up a prescription; it is a vital touchpoint for daily health. As people grow older, they often rely more heavily on medication and the advice of pharmacists to manage chronic conditions. In many cities, the idea of a "20-minute neighbourhood" has taken hold, a planning concept where essential services like groceries, schools, and clinics are within a short walk. For older adults, who may not drive or have limited mobility, the ability to walk to a pharmacy is not just a matter of convenience but a critical factor in whether they take their medicine consistently and stay healthy. When a pharmacy is too far away, the journey becomes a barrier, and that barrier can lead to missed doses and worsening health.
A team of researchers from several Australian institutions recently turned their attention to this issue in Greater Melbourne, one of the world's largest and most sprawling cities. They wanted to know a simple but difficult question: if an older person lives in Melbourne, can they actually walk to a pharmacy? To find out, they did not rely on rough estimates or simple maps that show straight lines. Instead, they built a detailed digital picture of the entire city, combining the locations of every pharmacy with the precise number of older residents living in every small block of land. They treated groups of pharmacies located in the same building or shopping centre as a single service point, recognizing that a cluster of shops in one spot does not mean better access for someone living a mile away. By drawing a circle around each pharmacy to represent an eight-hundred-meter walk, they could see exactly how many seniors lived inside that circle and how many were left outside.
The results revealed a stark reality. While the city is often praised for having good coverage, the researchers found that only about 44.6 percent of older adults in Greater Melbourne live within a comfortable walking distance of a pharmacy. This means that roughly 404,000 seniors, more than half of the older population, do not have a pharmacy nearby. The gap is not spread evenly across the city; it is a tale of two Melbournes. In the inner city, where the streets are dense and services are clustered, about 75 percent of older residents can walk to a pharmacy. However, as you move toward the outer edges and the coastal fringes, the numbers drop dramatically. On the Mornington Peninsula, for instance, only 28.5 percent of older adults have a pharmacy within walking distance. In these outer areas, a single pharmacy often serves a vast territory, with some service points responsible for more than 57,000 residents, including thousands of seniors who must travel far to get their medication.
The study highlights a significant mismatch between where people live and where services are located. The researchers noted that while the inner suburbs are well-served, the rapid growth of outer suburbs has not been matched by a proportional increase in pharmacies. This creates what the authors describe as "pharmacy deserts," large areas where the need for medication is high but the physical access is low. The situation is particularly challenging for those who cannot drive, as the distance to the nearest pharmacy becomes a daily obstacle. The data shows that in some outer regions, the ratio of residents to pharmacies is far worse than in other parts of the world, with some areas having one pharmacy for every 21,600 residents, compared to a much tighter ratio in the city center.
These findings suggest that the current distribution of pharmacies does not support the goal of an age-friendly city where daily needs are close at hand. The researchers argue that simply counting the total number of pharmacies in a city hides these deep inequalities. They point out that the problem is not just about distance, but about the design of the city itself, where new growth corridors have been built without ensuring that essential health services are within reach. To fix this, the authors suggest that planners and policymakers need to look beyond simple averages. They recommend targeted actions, such as creating incentives for new pharmacies to open in underserved areas, revising rules that currently limit where new outlets can be built, and exploring mobile services or delivery options for those who cannot walk. Without these changes, the gap between the inner city and the outer suburbs will likely widen, leaving a growing number of older residents without the easy access to medicines they need to live independently.
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