"I think the impact would be huge," says Ahsan Bhatti, owner of online pharmacy Quick Meds.
The service allows customers to make pharmacy transactions through Amazon and receive unlimited, free, two-day deliveries if they have a Prime membership. "What is lacking in every other pharmacy across the UK is the logistics and Amazon do that exceptionally well. It's exactly what consumers want - having a prescription by 10am and dispensed by Amazon to them in the evening. The likes of Lloyds Pharmacy and Boots can't do that, and independent pharmacies can only do this on a local level," says Mr Bhatti.Mr Bhatti opened Quick Meds in March, after putting in an application to the NHS 11 months earlier.
"In the US, companies like CVS and Walmart negotiate drug prices all the time, and they have a fairly significant amount of market power. They've been able to create monopolies on certain drugs, making it more difficult for consumers to access drugs if you're not shopping with them. If Amazon enters, it disrupts this because they have much more sizeable purchase power," says Kate McCarthy, healthcare analyst at research company Gartner.
Amazon Pharmacy is not just about the technology company entering the pharmaceutical retail market; it has been readying itself for the entire healthcare sector. Mr Galloway says that over the medium to long term, Amazon will put a number of healthcare companies out of business. At the same time, healthcare start-ups may struggle to get a foothold in a market that Amazon has entered.