"Our daughter was let down...this should never happen again"

The parents of a two-year-old year old girl who died of a common infection have called for change after an antibiotic shortage meant she couldn't get the medication she needed.

Adam and Jade Hodgkinson took their daughter Ava to the GP on December 13 2022 after she developed a chesty cough. They were confident she would get the care she needed, LancsLive reports.

However, due to an ongoing outbreak of Strep A - Group A Streptococcus - pharmacies across the country were experiencing a shortage of first-line antibiotic phenoxymethylpenicillin, so their the GP prescribed amoxicillin.

But when Adam went to Banks Pharmacy to collect the prescription he was told the correct dosage was also out of stock.

A new prescription was made available just the following morning, but just a few hours after taking her first dose, Ava had deteriorated.

And as her mum Jade carried her into A&E at Ormskirk & District General Hospital, the two-year-old went into cardiac arrest and tragically died.

This week, an inquest held in Preston heard that the government is "actively considering" making changes to legislation which would allow pharmacists to dispense alternative denominations of medications, if that which was originally prescribed isn't available.

Area Coroner Chris Long revealed he plans to send a Report to Prevent Future Deaths to Health Secretary Wes Streeting, to understand when and how this legislation can be changed. Currently, pharmacists are only allowed to prescribe an alternative denomination if the government has issued a Serious Shortage Protocol relating to medications which are low or out of stock.

After the inquest, Ava's parents Adam and Jade from Banks near Southport released a heart-breaking statement, in which they