THE 
AMERICAN  JOURNAL  OF  PHARMACY 
DECEMBER,  1874. 
PHARMACY  IN  DENMARK. 
By  Hans  M.  Wilder. 
There  having  appeared  in  the  American  Journal  of  Pharmacy 
notices  on  the  state  of  pharmacy  in  almost  every  country  in  Europe 
(Austria,  Belgium,  France,  Germany,  Great  Britain,  Holland,  Italy, 
Norway,  Russia,  Spain,  Sweden,  Switzerland  and  Turkey),  I  thought 
that  an  account  of  pharmacy  in  Denmark  would  not  be  entirely  un- 
called for. 
The  number  of  pharmacies  in  Denmark  (as  is  the  case  in  most 
European  countries)  is  limited  by  virtue  of  the  control  which  the 
Royal  Board  of  Health  exercises  over  them.  A  privilege  (license) 
is  granted  only  to  persons  who  are  recommended  by  the  Board  as 
competent  pharmacists,  and  then  only  where  a  real  want  of  a  phar- 
macy exists.  There  are  two  classes  of  privileges  :  real  and  (chiefly 
since  1842)  personal.  A  real  privilege  is  transferable,  and  can  be 
bought  by  any  one  who  has  fulfilled  all  the  requirements  of  the  law. 
(All  privileges  granted  before  1842  are  practically  considered  real.) 
A  personal  privilege,  on  the  contrary,  is  granted  only  for  lifetime, 
and  is,  consequently,  non-transferable.  When  the  owner  of  such  a 
privilege  dies,  the  place  is  open  for  a  new  competition,  unless  the 
widow,  as  is  generally  the  case,  is  granted  permission  for  one  or  more- 
years  to  conduct  the  business  under  the  supervision  of  a  provisor. 
They  are  now  trying  to  convert  the  "real  "  privileges  into  "  per- 
sonal 9t  ones,  but  experience  the  same  trouble  as  pharmacists  do  in 
Germany  and  elsewhere;  and  I  think  that  Sweden  is,  as  yet,  the 
only  country  which  has  approached  a  satisfactory  solution  the  near- 
est. Respecting  "free  trade,"  there  exists  the  same  hard  struggle^ 
as  in  other  countries,  between  pharmacists  with  stores  and  those  with- 
34 
