Cheaper prescriptions plan to proceed as Senate votes down Coalition attempt to block 60-day dispensing

Patients will be able to buy two months of medicine from pharmacies for price of one, saving more than $1.6bn over four years

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Patients with chronic conditions are set to receive two months of medicine for the price of one from 1 September, after the Senate voted down a Coalition push to tear up Labor’s 60-day dispensing changes.

The changes, which are estimated to save six million Australians up to $180 a year for each medicine, faced a disallowance motion brought by the opposition in the Senate on Thursday morning.

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