CVS to Stop Selling Cigarettes

CVS announced this morning that it will stop selling cigarettes and other tobacco products at its more than 7,600 U.S. stores.

This is important news to NBCH members and employer in general. Tobacco cessation is a topic identified by NBCH members as a priority, and several of you have engaged in significant projects in your communities. This CVS news is an important step forward, but there is siginificnt room for improvement by the health care system as a whole. For example, health plans that participated in eValue8 2013 identified an average of 2.3% of their members were smokers (high of 11.%, low of 0.1%). The CDC estimates 19% of the population are smokers, so the plans are thus far unable to help employers to accurately identify the scope of the smoking problems within their employee population.

"Ending the sale of cigarettes and tobacco products at CVS/pharmacy is the right thing for us to do for our customers and our company to help people on their path to better health," said Larry J. Merlo, President and CEO, CVS Caremark. "Put simply, the sale of tobacco products is inconsistent with our purpose."

Smoking, the top cause of premature death, kills more than 480,000 people in the U.S. annually.