Editor's Note: As the ongoing battle with Woolworths escalated with official pharmacy, pharmacy students assisted by organising a demonstration, plus helped to distribute a petition against proposed NSW state legislation.
This galvanised support with the community at large, and has established a new dimension in the survival tactics of pharmacy.

Late last year I had a conversation with a very concerned, mature age student.
This financially established, hard working gentleman enrolled so he could one day buy his own pharmacy.
Three years down the track he claimed that he wasn't prepared to invest in an industry that would enviably be deregulated.
My jaw hit the floor.

This year, when Bob Carr broke his promise, the risk became even more apparent.
Alarm bells rang so loud I waited for the fire trucks to come.
Students did their bit in receiving signatures of support from the public.
They took petitions back to college, to their apartment buildings, to their corner stores and onto the bus on the way home.
But why, did I hear, as the petition forms were being passed around one lecture "How long do you think until it happens?"

On Wednesday 21st April close to two hundred pharmacy students walked the streets of Sydney.
They explained that to deregulate pharmacy meant that the public risked no longer getting the health advice they need and deserve. One thousand people signed in agreement in just one hour.
It astounded me how willing people were to sign, they came to us. Pharmacy as we know it was doing something right.
In attempt to confront the man who would jeopardize their future, Mr Roger Corbett, CEO of Woolworths, students rallied outside the prestigious Shrangri-La hotel.
Roger spoke to hundreds of well paying business men, but Roger did not speak to us.
Instead he slunk through the back door, as one newspaper called him "Roger the Dodger".
We have all heard his outlandish statements that have not once reflected the true reason why we want to preserve our future.
Our message was simple "we are about health not wealth;we give advice not focus on price".
We did not work that hard at school to be able to enroll for a course that would send us back to being checkout chicks.
We did not spend four years studying so hard at university, to work for a company that does not care about the health and well being of its customers.
With respect to the 200 students who stood up for what they believe in I want to ask a question.
If there are 800 students enrolled in Sydney why were there only 200 at the rally?
Why when I walked into lectures as the troops were heading off were there faces still staring back at me?
Why were students so concerned about a 10% quiz when their future was being attacked?
Furthermore, why did a good friend of mine have to resign from her job because her pharmacy was being relocated into a PriceLine store?
Why do PriceLine pharmacies exist?
Why isn't every pharmacy accredited?
Why doesn't every pharmacy offer MMR services?
Why do some not realize that the knowledge we gain is pointless unless we work in a place where it can be utilized?
Why do others not realize that when you sell your soul the devil uses you?
Why aren't we utilizing the resources that we have?
Why did only half of the pharmacists' polled on the Austpharmlist believe that pharmacy would win the battle?
Have we already given up on our future?
Are we our own curse?

History has shown destruction of the greatest empires comes from within.
I've heard pharmacists tell me they don't care.
I've heard professors state that deregulation won't be detrimental. I've even heard a dean (not mine) state that he didn't care what kind of industry he sent his future pharmacists into.
There is no enviable, there is only a future that you make.
But we have to all to make it together.
And we must believe.