Thank you for your request for information about the following:

Request

‘We have already accessed prescribing data for individual items directly from the NHS BSA website, but we are interested in the number of drugs prescribed by patients, not just volumes, as we are trying to ascertain the number of patients taking GLP-1 RA drugs in England.

We have come across this dataset for statins from an analysis performed by BMJ that holds the type of aggregated patient data we are interested in. Please see attached for a version NHS BSA provided to the BMJ.

Would it be possible to request equivalent data that you provided to the BMJ for statins, for the drugs we requested in the FOI request? If we have missed the patient-metric data in your public-facing datasets, please do let us know - any more direction would be appreciated. We use the prescribing data on your website regularly, and have not been able to work out a way to do it.’

[On 16 April 2026 you clarified your request as follows]

‘We would ideally like all 3 chemical substances alongside the respective names of the drug brands dispensed (any, not just the ones listed in the email). If not possible, the 3 chemical substances (liraglutide, semaglutide, tirzepatide) is sufficient.

If the first is possible, we can group the brand level dataset to also get the data at the chemical substance level, but if you could provide both that would be great.

Some of the key metrics we are interested include unique patient count, gender, ethnicity, diagnosis (if possible!). The unique patient count and diagnosis are the metrics we are interested in the most as we currently only have access to drugs prescribed by volumes.

It would be preferred if the data was presented by calendar year.’

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) received your request on 1 April 2026, with clarification received on 16 April 2026.

We have handled your request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA).

Our response

I can confirm that the NHSBSA holds the information you have requested and a copy of the information is attached.

Please read the below notes to ensure correct understanding of the data.

NHSBSA

NHS Prescription Services process prescriptions for Pharmacy Contractors, Appliance Contractors, Dispensing Doctors and Personal Administration with information then used to make payments to pharmacists and appliance contractors in England for prescriptions dispensed in primary care settings (other arrangements are in place for making payments to Dispensing Doctors and Personal Administration). This involves processing over 1 billion prescription items and payments totalling over £9 billion each year. The information gathered from this process is then used to provide information on costs and trends in prescribing in England and Wales to over 25,000 registered NHS and Department of Health and Social Care users.

Data Source

The data source was the NHSBSA Information Services Data Warehouse.

Exclusions

The Data excludes:

• Items not dispensed, disallowed and those returned to the contractor for further clarification.

• Prescriptions prescribed and dispensed in Prisons, Hospitals and Private prescriptions.

• Items prescribed but not presented for dispensing or not submitted to NHS Prescription Services by the dispenser.

• Items supplied under NHS pharmacy advanced services.

Time Period

January 2016 to January 2026, presented by calendar year. Please note that 2026 only includes prescribing from January 2026.

Organisation Data

The data provided is for prescriptions prescribed England, presented at practice level.

Patients

The dataset is broken down by the patient's gender using the latest patient gender information from NHS Personal Demographic Service (PDS) held by the NHSBSA Information Services data warehouse at the time that the data was extracted, and ten-year age bands with a maximum age band of 90+.

Prescriptions are only included if an NHS Number has been captured during NHSBSA processing. NHS Numbers were recorded on 98.92% of prescriptions for these chemical substances within the time period.

Drugs

Limited to the following BNF chemical substances:

Semaglutide (0601023AW)

Tirzepatide (0601023AZ)

Liraglutide (0601023AB)

Data Queries

Please contact foirequests@nhsbsa.nhs.uk ensuring you quote the above reference if you have any specific questions regarding this response; or, if you feel you may be misunderstanding or misinterpreting the information; or, if you plan on publishing the data.

Reusing the data and copyright

If you plan on producing a press or broadcast story based upon the data please contact communicationsteam@nhsbsa.nhs.uk. This is important to ensure that the figures are not misunderstood or misrepresented.

The information supplied to you continues to be protected by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and is subject to NHSBSA copyright. This information is licenced under the terms of the Open Government Licence detailed at:

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/

Should you wish to re-use the information you must include the following statement: “NHSBSA Copyright 2026”. Failure to do so is a breach of the terms of the licence.

Information you receive which is not subject to NHSBSA Copyright continues to be protected by the copyright of the person, or organisation, from which the information originated. Please obtain their permission before reproducing any third party (non NHSBSA Copyright) information.