“Of the 88,930 retail pharmacies operating during 2010-20, 29.4% had closed by 2021,” a US study in the Health Affairs journal last week (December 3) revealed.
“Independent pharmacies were at greater risk of closure than chain pharmacies,” it found.
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The research – carried out by academics at the University of Southern California, the University of California Berkeley and Johns Hopkins University – revealed that more pharmacies closed than opened in the US between 2018 and 2021.
“Policy makers should consider strategies to increase the participation of independent pharmacies in Medicare and Medicaid,” the study said.
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And “public insurance reimbursement rates” for pharmacies at the “highest risk of closure” should be increased, it added.
Further findings from the study showed that “the risk of closure for pharmacies in predominantly Black and Latinx neighbourhoods was higher than in White neighbourhoods”.
In the UK, new analysis of pharmacy closure data last month found that pharmacies “will cease trading” within 15 years and become “extinct” if nothing is done to stop closures.
US pharmacy latest
It comes as Boots parent company Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) announced a “footprint optimisation program targeting approximately 1,200 closures over the next three years” in October.
A WBA spokesperson confirmed to C+D at the time that the fresh wave of closures related to Walgreens US locations.
And the company reported operating losses of $14.1 billion in 2024, up “104.5% compared to the year-ago period” when it was $6.9bn.
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Meanwhile, WBA and Boots’ sister company Walgreens paid a joint settlement of $106.8 million (roughly £80.9m) in September for submitting “false claims” to government healthcare programmes for prescriptions that were not dispensed.
The US government said at the time that Walgreens scored “tens of millions of dollars” from US federal healthcare programmes such as Medicare and Medicaid for prescriptions that were “never dispensed”.
