Case Study : Cvs Health Announced

The company will lose over 2 million dollars in sales from customers who buy cigarettes and other tobacco products. The overall sales were over 123 billion dollars in 2012 (NY Times, 2014). By October 1, 2014, over 7,6000 stores nationwide stopped selling these products. According to president and CEO Larry Merlo, this is the right decision for the company and customers because selling tobacco does not correlate with their purpose. Be removing the products, they will better serve patients, clients and health care providers (CVS Health, 2014).

There are many efforts made by CVS Health to be “green”. For example, the company is currently assessing the scope 3 emissions under green gas protocol. The company is partnering with largest suppliers to expand data collection in 2017. Their intensity goal and measurements include scope 1 and 2 as well as scope 3. CVS Health achieved cumulative reduction in carbon intensity of 23% per square foot of retail space. This is due to new buildings conforming to the 2012 international Energy Conservation Code, requiring greater insulation and other efficiently measures. There was a decreased heating command in 2016. Regarding electricity and natural gas, the company used 2.85 million megawatt hours of electricity to operate retail locations in 2016. The company achieved

CVS Health generate revenue mainly from Pharmacy Services Segment and Retail Pharmacy segment. Pharmacy services segment revenue includes: the portion of the price the client pays directly to the PSS, price paid by client plan members for mail order prescriptions or for retail prescriptions and administrative fees for retail pharmacy network contracts. Under PSS revenues generated from the sale of prescription drugs are recognized when the prescription is delivered, and when the prescription drugs are sold by third party pharmacies at the point-of-sale. In Retail Pharmacy Segment revenues are recognize at the time the customer takes possession of the merchandise and at the time the services are performed at RPS’ health care clinics.

Tobacco smoking is the largest preventable cause of death and diseases in the United States of America. Close to 480,000 Americans lose their life each year due to illness caused by smoking cigarette. (Healthy People 2020, 2010).

In the United States, smoking cigarettes is the number one preventable cause of morbidity and death (Bergen, 1999), and accounts for $300 Billion in health care costs and economic productivity loss (Jamal, 2015). While the national smoking rate is 16.8% (CDC, 2016), specific demographics are more susceptible to developing smoking habits: people who live below the poverty line (10.9% higher), disabled or with a limitation (6.2% higher), and males (4.7% higher) (Agaku, 2014).

CVS health hasn’t always been that name at one point they went by CVS Caremark and still some of the things they have out there are named CVS Caremark. The main corporation is based out of Woonsocket Rhode Island. There are roughly 8,500 CVS Health pharmacies and clinics around the world with more to be built eventually. CVS Health is ranked number ten on the fortune 500 and has went up in ranking yearly. CVS stands for convenience, value, service.

The Fortune 500 company I chose is CVS Health. I chose this for a few different reasons. First, I recently had to visit the Minute Clinic in the CVS store twice within the last month. Secondly, I chose CVS because it is part of the health care initiative and I work for a healthcare company.

I think it is a good decision, CVS stops selling tobacco. Cigarettes are the main leading cause of preventable disease, disability and death. CVS is a health care provider, not a general store where shoppers can stop in to pick up some Pepsi, deodorant, and a pack of smokes. Dropping to sell tobacco will not be much of a financial sacrifice for the company either. Because, cigarettes are responsible for even less of its profits, but for a CVS company that makes most of its money by selling prescription drugs. More than half of CVS’s revenue comes from its "pharmacy services"

In 2014, CVS collaborated with the American Lung Association in the fight against lung cancer. A part of the LUNG FORCE, CVS has taken many strides to help prevent cancer through the halt of tobacco sales in all stores and donations to the American Lung Association. From December 2014 to June 2015, CVS hosted an in-store fundraiser to raise money and awareness for lung cancer (Kanani 2014). There was also a one percent reduction in tobacco sales in the United States in the months following CVS’ decision to stop selling cigarettes; this amounts for 95 million cigarette packs.

Several product tactics were develop and used simultaneously at different levels such as federal state and city in order to promote a healthier lifestyle smokeless. Tobacco is addictive what makes quitting very challenging so combined strategies seem to work better giving the person the ability to choose the combination that better works at any time. The first and most promoted product strategy used by the CDC “Tips from Former Smokers” as well as “Illinois Tobacco Quit Yes” Programs is widely spread information about the harms tobacco consumption can cause. The media has spread knowledge not only in smoke products as cigarettes but also smokeless tobacco by showing real stories with real people whom are suffering the consequences of tobacco use. The intention is to highlight the product’s harm and make it less attractive to both, current users and potential ones. Once the decision to quit has been made it is necessary to raise awareness about alternatives to help during the process. This is another very important strategy used by these campaigns. Tobacco surrogates such as patches, guns, Inhalers, and others are made available over the counter to anyone who needs to buy them. These products help with the cravings and withdrawn syndrome.

The American Heart Association reports an even gloomier number, “Cigarette smoking is the most important preventable cause of premature death in the United States. It accounts for more than 440,000 of the more than 2.4 million annual deaths. Cigarette smokers have a higher risk of developing a number of chronic disorders. (AHA, 2005).

An estimated 36.5 million or 15.1 % of adults aged 18 years old and older currently smoke cigarettes and more than 16,000,000 have smoking or live with diseases that are related to smoking. According to US department of health and human services, over the past five decades, there is a significant decline in cigarette smoking in the U.S. The progress has slowed in recent years and the prevalence of use of other tobacco products such as vapes, e-cigars and smokeless tobacco

Nicotine use is a leading preventable cause of death in the world, directly and indirectly responsible for 440,000 deaths per year. The health problems that result in tobacco use tally an annual of $75 billion in direct medical costs (Slovic 36). That money spent on medical problems for smokers should be used to pay for more important things in our society such as schools, libraries, childcare, etc.

The tobacco industry is important to the economy. In 1991, worldwide tobacco sales exceeded $59.8 billion and in 1992 the industry was rated as one of the top one hundred advertisers (Pechmann and Ratneshwar, 1994). However, there are high prices to pay - socially, economically, and personally - as a result of this industry. Annual mortality figures indicate that cigarette smoking is the number one cause of preventable death in the United States. An estimated 390,000 people die each year of smoke related illnesses, which is greater than the combined mortality for cocaine, crack, AIDS, homicide, suicide, and alcohol abuse (Botvin, G., Baker, Botvin, E., Dusenbury, Cardwell, and Diaz, 1993).

The tobacco industry kills more people in North America from Monday to Thursday of each week than the terrorists murdered in total on September 11, 2001. That sounds unrealistic, doesn’t it? Well, smoking is an epidemic that affects us all, whether you are a smoker or you aren’t. In order to stop this epidemic, we need to