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Pharmacy retailer CVS/Caremark announced Wednesday that it’ll stop selling cigarettes along with other tobacco products at its a lot more than 7,600 CVS/pharmacy stores over the U.S. by October 1. This will make CVS/pharmacy the first national pharmacy chain to accept part of support of the health and well-being of their patients and customers, based on an announcement.
“Ending the sale of any nicotine products and cigarettes and tobacco products at CVS/pharmacy may be the right thing for us to do for our customers and our company to help individuals on their own road to better health,” said CVS Caremark President and CEO, Larry J. Merlo, within the release Wednesday. “Put simply, the sale of tobacco products is irregular with our purpose.”
“I applaud [CVS’s] decision to stop selling cigarettes and tobacco products,” said Dr. Allison Benthal, an internal medicine physician with Advocate Medical Group?in Libertyville, Ill. “As a health care provider, I encourage patients to really take that step in stopping smoking if they’ve started, and also to reinforce to kids and teenagers not to start.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that, worldwide, tobacco use causes a lot more than 5 million deaths each year, and current trends show that tobacco use may cause more than 8 million deaths annually by 2030. Further, cigarette smoking is responsible for about 1 in 5 deaths annually, and on average smokers die 10 years sooner than non-smokers.
“As an innovator of the health care community focused on improving health outcomes, we are pledging to help millions of Americans stop smoking,” said [CVS President] Merlo. “Along with removing cigarettes on the market, we will to experience a robust national smoking cessation program.”
Further, this year marks the 50th anniversary from the first Surgeon General’s report on smoking and health. A study published around the anniversary within the Journal from the American Medical Association estimated that efforts controlling tobacco within the last Half a century have saved 8 million lives.
The CVS move may be the latest in a number of public efforts to curb smoking cigarettes. This year the CDC launched a comprehensive anti-smoking campaign that included “hard-hitting ads showing people coping with the painful consequences of smoking or exposure to secondhand smoke.” The campaign was successful, according to the CDC site. Because of the commercials:
- An estimated 1.6 million people designed a quit attempt.
- More than 100,000 smokers will stay quit.
- An estimated 6 million nonsmokers talked with friends and family concerning the risks of smoking.
