CVS to become first major U.S. drugstore to drop cigarettes

[onehandle]

Last edited Wed Feb 5, 2014, 10:49 AM - Edit history (3)

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - CVS Caremark Corp said on Wednesday that it would stop selling tobacco products at its 7,600 stores by October, becoming the first U.S. drugstore chain to take cigarettes off the shelf. Public health experts called the decision by the No. 2 U.S. drugstore chain a precedent-setting step that could pressure other stores to follow suit.

CVS, whose Caremark unit is a major pharmacy benefits manager for corporations and the government Medicare program, believes the decision will strengthen its position as a healthcare provider. "I think it will put pressure on other retailers who want to be in healthcare," said CVS Caremark Chief Medical Officer Dr. Troyen Brennan.

Although some U.S. cities, including Boston and San Francisco, already ban the sale of tobacco products in pharmacies, advocates hope CVS' voluntary decision will have a ripple effect among other pharmacy chains. Some retailers stopped selling cigarettes years ago: Target Corp decided to drop them in 1996, while East Coast supermarket chain Wegmans Food Markets did so in 2008.

Matthew Myers, president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, which advocates for tobacco control, said that CVS's announcement could drive momentum for declining tobacco use. Dr. Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, chief executive officer of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which focuses on public health, called CVS' decision "a bold, precedent-setting move because it acknowledges that pharmacies have become healthcare settings."

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/05/us-cvscaremark-cigarettes-idUSBREA140RP20140205

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The end is nigh for public smoking.

An American Heart Association expert on MSNBC was just asked if sugar should be banned at CVS, because of its harmful effects. She responded that cigarettes are different because 'smoking works as designed, to kill you.'

[Sherman A1]

1. I was wondering who would be the first and when

I believe it's well past time for companies who purport to be interested in their customers health to get out of the cigarette business.

[musiclawyer]

25. Laying the groundwork to be the first to sell legal weed

Big corporate chains that is. I have zero doubts. Watch !

[meti57b]

2. my thanks to CVS! ..... a true pubilc service!

[AllyCat]

3. Walgreens cashiers wear a name badge purporting something about health as

They stand in front of a wall of cigarettes

[RebelOne]

22. I know as I buy cigarettes there all the time

because they are cheaper. I hope Walgreens does not follow suit.

[sweetloukillbot]

44. I worked at Walgreens 20 years ago and there was talk about this then

The company was transitioning from the strip mall stores to the standalone ones, and whenever they were building new stores they weren't including liquor departments because they felt it didn't go along with the pharmacy's health focus. IIRC, it was a major point at a shareholder's meeting around 1993 or 94. There was serious talk about removing cigarettes also. Ultimately it didn't happen, although the vast majority of the stores built (at least in Phoenix) did not have liquor departments after about 1995. Of course they're bringing liquor back into most of them nowadays so there must have been a change of attitude.

[LionsTigersRedWings]

4. That's amazing!!!!

[yellowwoodII]

5. Corporate Responsibility

Thank you, CVS! I am pulling my (one) prescription from Walgreens to CVS in a show of solidarity!

[underpants]

6. Good for them

I was just about to post this

[durablend]

7. No doubt teabaggers will be boycotting

"DAMN YOU OBAMACARE!!!! YOU SUCK CVS!!!! I'M TAKING MY BUSINESS ELSEWHERE!!!! EXPECT BILLIONS OF US TO DO THE SAME!!!! YOU'LL REGRET IT!!!!"

[mdbl]

8. LOL

[tridim]

9. This is a Costco type move. Good for them!

[Mosby]

33. Doesn't Costco sell tobacco?

[PennyK]

10. Great news

I quit (moved to e-cigs) just in time!

[mac56]

11. Good for CVS

As someone once pointed out, at a drugstore it's weird how you need to walk all the way to the back to get a prescription, but you can buy cigarettes right by the door.

[erpowers]

12. Whoa

I think that is a big deal. I never thought stores or pharmacies would ever stop selling cigarettes.

[RobinA]

38. I Never Knew

they sold cigarettes, and I smoke!

[erpowers]

39. Where Did You Get Your Cigarettes? n/t

[CBGLuthier]

13. At least now there is a clear cut reason to pick one over the other

CVS and Walgreens had a building contest in Oklahoma City over the last 10 years. A lot of our major intersections have a CVS on one corner and a Walgreens on the other so it is usually a coin toss on those incredibly rare occasions I have to shop these types of stores.

[Nika]

14. This is very good news. I hope other chains follow suit.

[Coyotl]

15. How long until they are selling medical marijuana?

Step one, get rid of the death sticks, step two, .........

[father founding]

16. hollywood will step it up

Expect to see more smoking in movies and tv now.

[LongTomH]

40. That's already happening

Examples: American Hustle and the new series on BBC: Fleming: The Man Who Would Be Bond.

[truthisfreedom]

17. Yay! Smoking cigarettes sucks!

[packman]

18. As a person that lost a brother and a father

to those "Coffin Nails" I say bravo to CVS. Hell, I remember those GI Posters with a cig dangling out of the corner of a weary soldier's mouth, and the sample packs the tobacco companies used to pass out on campus, and how every movie you went to back when had the hero smoking like a Pittsburgh Steel factory chimney.

[happyslug]

26. I once watched a James Cagney movie about Lon Chaney Sr.

It is amazing to look at a 1957 movie and NOT see a single cigarette. Lon Chaney Sr died of Lung Cancer in 1931. He was a chain smoker.

James Cagney in "A man with a Thousand faces":

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050681/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_9

[davidpdx]

46. Lost my father to them

He had a stroke when he was only 43 and survived, but ended up dying of a stroke at the age of 55. Never quit.

[durablend]

19. As expected, there's a few that don't agree

"My choice to smoke is being taken away from me...freedom of speech....evil Obama....first my cigarettes then my guns...blah blah blah". Just check their FB page

(oh and as I said above "You'll be going out of business SOON when we BOYCOTT!!!"...ayup someone said it)

[frylock]

21. the beauty of the free market is that these idiots are free to buy cigs at another market..

of course they're going to get their fee-fees all hurt with their perpetual persecution complex.

[RebelOne]

23. I am one of those idiots who buys cigarettes

and my fee-fees are not hurt. There are plenty of other places to buy them.

[frylock]

31. precisely

[packman]

41. Cig smokers, tobacco users

A drain on the health care system, I'm paying (as are you, even more so) for the black lung and mouth cancers. Tax the hell out of tobacco to pay for these future patients, people who can't understand what they are doing.

[Comrade Grumpy]

28. Thanks for calling smokers idiots. That's most helpful.

I, for one, would rather hang out with idiots than self-righteous jerks.

[frylock]

32. i'm calling the idiots that are shouting for a boycott idiots..

if you're not calling for a boycott of CVS for taking your gawd given right to purchase cigs away then we're good here.

[JDPriestly]

20. Good news. We have a CVS in our area. I wil shop there more frequently now that I know

that CVS is serious not just about making profits but about promoting healthy living.

Good for CVS.

[ForgoTheConsequence]

24. This is an outrage.

Rabble rabble rabble, smokers rights, oppression, tyranny.



This is great news.

[Bennyboy]

27. Now, will they stop selling booze, fatty foods, and animal tested cosmetics?

Oh yeah.

[Humanist_Activist]

43. The CEO of CVS Caremark has stated that dieticians will say...

along with doctors, that all those things, IN MODERATION, aren't harmful, and in some cases can actually be helpful(small amounts of alcohol). The same cannot be said of cigarettes and tobacco use.

As far as the animal tested cosmetics, no clue, as I don't know what there stance is on that, nor what manufacturers still do animal testing on cosmetics.

[TygrBright]

29. Well done, CVS!

I don't believe in prohibition or criminalization of self-harming substances.

But I DO believe in control, and the use of access restrictions, education, and prevention programs to help people not use them.

You see a fifteen-year-old hangin' out at the Walgreens? Could be doing anything, no problem.

You see a fifteen-year-old hangin' out at the Smoke Shop? Check it out. Move them on.

Let's get all tobacco/nicotine products out of general sale outlets and into smoke shops. Many benefits to everyone except the poor unfortunate addicts exercising their Constitutional rights to harm themselves.

happily,
Bright

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

30. I've chosen to go back to smoking

After having quit for years, I've chosen to take up a pipe again, not because I'm addicted to tobacco (I don't have an addictive nature at all about anything, drugs, tobacco, alcohol, food or anything else, and I hadn't smoked in a long time) but because I love smoking a pipe and I missed that relaxing pleasure. My father suffered and died from lung cancer so I know what I'm exposing myself to. But this move by CVS doesn't bother me, as long as I can find sources for good smoking tobacco elsewhere. It's my choice to prefer dying younger but enjoying this aspect of life while I live. Longevity to me is not nearly as important for it's own sake as how I choose to enjoy the time I have on this Earth.

[Mosby]

34. It's a good move

But I think there is more here than a company making a business decision based on community concerns.

I suspect that CVS isn't selling as much tobacco products than in the past, with reduced sales over time, then including the cost of theft, time consuming inventory processes and the rise of "smoke shops" it wasn't worth the effort anymore.

[Politicalboi]

35. CVS Cigarettes, Vodka, and Soda

Damn. I don't think I've ever bought cigarettes there, but now by October I can't.

"There" taking away my freedumbs. First are national anthem, now are cigarettes.

[durablend]

36. Wait until they take away are guns!

Because CLEARLY this is the first step towards it!!!!!

[bitchkitty]

37. Good. n/t

[Blue Owl]

42. As the song "King of the Road" says...

"...ain't got no cigarettes..."

[Cha]

45. WoWOWOWOWOWWOWOWOW.. don't they

make a lot of money selling cigs? I know they cost a lot and people are addicted so I figured it might be a good profit margin?

Thanks CVS!

[davidpdx]

47. Good news

I hope some of the other chains follow their lead.

[nilesobek]

48. I am a cashier for a major corporation.

I feel like a purveyor of death on a daily basis. Lots of people like to chew tobacco around here, they come with obvious defects in their faces from chewing it and they still buy it.

I have a bit of an existential crisis selling all this booze and tobacco. The only way I can get through it is to drink after work.

I totally support CVS for this, only if it were my company, I'd be out of a job, a job I struggled mightily to get and hold, even working for six weeks straight while sick as a dog, having perfect attendance.

They make a huge profit off cigarettes, so you know this was a moral decision.