CVS to Stop the Sale of All Tobacco Products as of October 1st

“Tobacco has no place in a setting where healthcare is delivered."

This quote by CVS president and CEO Larry Merlo comes after the decision to rid the sales of tobacco products from their 7,600 stores in the U.S. by October 1st. They are the first national pharmacy chain to eliminate the sale of tobacco in all their stores.

Merlo called the decision, “ a significant step toward promoting better health in helping people manage conditions that are worsened by smoking."

Although the decision to stop selling tobacco will cost the nation’s second-largest pharmacy chain more than it will cigarette manufacturers Merlo said banning these products “is the right decision” for the company even though doing so would cost it some $2 billion annually in tobacco and related sales.

CVS’s chief medical officer Troy Brennan says, "CVS and their employees should be helping patients manage their medications for diseases like diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease." He agreed with Merlo's decision saying, “It’s really antithetical, as a result, to have a product in our store, tobacco, which actually causes these kinds of diseases, so that’s why it’s so important that we eliminate the sale of tobacco products today."

While CVS has made  a decision against tobacco, Walgreens, the nation’s largest drugstore chain, said it's still mulling the sale of tobacco at its stores.

Emily Hartwig, a spokesperson for the chain said, "We have been evaluating this product category for some time to balance the choices our customers expect from us, with their ongoing health needs. We will continue to evaluate the choice of products our customers want, while also helping to educate them and providing smoking cessation products and alternatives that help to reduce the demand for tobacco products."

Although Drugstores account for only 4 percent of cigarettes sold in the U.S., "selling tobacco in a pharmacy sends the wrong message about social acceptability", according to Steven Schroeder, MD, of the UCSF Smoking Cessation Leadership Center, as he explained in a viewpoint article online in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

"Although the sale of tobacco products in CVS pharmacies produces more than $1.5 billion in revenues annually, the financial gain is outweighed by the paradox inherent in promoting health while contributing to tobacco-related deaths," He wrote.

How do you feel about tobacco products being snatched off of the shelves of your local pharmacy? Do you feel that it is in the best interest of the consumers or do you think it is their choice to buy what they wish at their own peril?

Follow Brittnye Webb-Earl on Twitter @BeeNoelle

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Thursday, February 6, 2014