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The owner of a chain of pharmacists in the North has said that he has noticed a sizeable increase in the number of customers from the Republic over the past 18 months.
Paul McKeever owns ten pharmacies called McKeevers Chemists in the North, with the majority situated on the border.
McKeever said there had always been some ''business from the south'', but that customers from the Republic now represented between 30 per cent and 50 per cent of his business at weekends.
"Sometimes, we have traders who come in to buy toiletries and put them on their shelves. They don't even ask for discounts," he said.
''In years gone by, people came North for their weekly shop and their alcohol. People increasingly began to look at what else was available on the healthcare side. It has gradually built up. The cost of what people were paying down south maybe didn't matter so much during the boom but, with the downturn, I think people are more analytical."
He said the stronger buying power of the euro had also had an impact. ''Medicines were always cheaper here, but that [exchange rate] has made them even cheaper again," he said.
McKeever said massive savings could be made on generic medicines in the North. When a medicine is first invented, it gets a patent. The patent expires, other manufactures can apply to the authorities for a licence to produce an identical version of the medicine.
McKeever estimated they were as much as 75 per cent cheaper. Sizeable savings can also be made on the cost of original brands.
''In Northern Ireland, the market is quite tight. We have to run our pharmacies very efficiently. We are under quite a bit of pressure ourselves. Our overheads, such as wages, rents and rates, are also a lot lower. If you are sitting in a shopping centre in the south, the rent is astronomical," McKeever said.
