Ed Sweda must be dusting off his costume and doing a little dance. Sweda is the longtime archnemesis of Big Tobacco and, as senior counsel for the Group Against Smoking Pollution (GASP), was one of the strongest advocates to ban cigarettes and tobacco sales in Massachusetts and eliminate smoking.
Old-time State House denizens will remember Sweda’s days of roaming the halls in his Grim Reaper costume to get attention and support for a variety of measures that launched the state into the forefront of the fight against smoking. Yesterday’s announcement by CVS Caremark that the company’s 7,600 stores will no longer sell cigarettes as of next year was an aim of anti-smoking advocates for years and is one of the loudest non-governmental efforts to stamp out butts – or at least acknowledge the contradiction between selling carcinogenic products in a retail environment dedicated to health.
“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,” Larry Merlo, president and CEO of CVS Caremark, said in a release. “Put simply, the sale of tobacco products is inconsistent with our purpose.”
Everyone from President Obama to the man on the street – at least the ones not smoking – hailed the decision. CVS estimates it will lose about $2 billion in sales from the move, about $1.5 billion in tobacco sales and another half-billion in ancillary sales that those who buy cigarettes would have purchased at the same time.
But the CVS decision raises the question of whether this was a strategic business decision based on the company’s efforts to become a health care provider rather than a retail establishment or just a reaction to a shifting regulatory climate. Tobacco and related sales account for less than 2 percent of the company’s annual $123 billion in gross revenues. The company has been expanding its Minute Clinics around the country where they are allowed and its advertising and marketing has been focused on the white coats of its pharmacists and the health products it carries.
CVS, which is the largest pharmacy chain in the country, is also intent on being the leader of the movement and getting its competitors to follow suit. Dr. Troyen Brennan, CVS’s chief medical director, co-authored an op-ed published yesterday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, where he urged others in the field to follow suit.
“If people understand that retail outlets that plan to promote health, provide pharmacy services, and house retail clinics are no longer going to sell tobacco products, the social unacceptability of tobacco use will be substantially reinforced-indeed, the continued sale would appear to sanction the most unhealthy habit a person can maintain,” Brennan wrote in the piece. “If pharmacies do not make this effort voluntarily, federal or state regulatory action would be appropriate.”
At least 50 communities in Massachusetts, including Boston, have passed legislation banning the sale of tobacco products at drug stores and businesses such as supermarkets that have pharmacies inside their buildings. Nationally, the numbers are skimpy but San Francisco is one notable city that has also forbidden tobacco sales in drug stores. The numbers suggest CVS Caremark may have been reading the smoke signals.
But it also makes some skeptics wonder why CVS is zeroing in on tobacco and not addressing other preventable health issues such as obesity, heart disease, and the like. Once the Marlboros are gone from the counter, you’ll still be able to fill up your CVS basket with gum, candy, soda, chips, and a plethora of other unhealthy items. What will happen when they come for your nacho-flavored Doritos?
“Unlike those other products, which are OK in moderation, no amount of tobacco is safe,” CVS spokeswoman Danielle Marcus writes in an email to U.S. News. “Smoking is the leading cause of illness and death in the United States which is why we chose to eliminate them from our stores.”
–JACK SULLIVAN
BEACON HILL
Rep. Carlos Henriquez, who faces an expulsion vote today in the House, issues a statement asserting his innocence, State House News reports. A copy of the statement is here. The House Ethics Committee’s expulsion report is here. Henriquez may take to the House floor Thursday to fight the expulsion order. The NAACP urges the House not to expel Henriquez.
A Berkshires firm that did not receive a medical marijuana license plans to appeal the Department of Public Health decision.
The Berkshire Eagle finds new proposals to strengthen state gun laws “thoughtful and well-reasoned.”
A report from the Pioneer Institute recommends overhauling the membership of the MBTA pension fund board and raising the retirement age for T workers from 55 to 60.
MUNICIPAL MATTERS
A Globe editorial says the first big test of Mayor Marty Walsh’s independence will be his handling of a reform-resistant fire department and moves its interim commissioner has already made that have been an “enormous setback.”
The Lawrence City Council ousts Mayra Lantigua, the former mayor’s ex-wife, from the Licensing Board, the Eagle-Tribune reports.
It’s always been muttered, but Greater Boston says they found no evidence that some Boston neighborhoods get priorities over others when it comes to snowplowing.
The Beverly City Council approves the creation of a $75,000-a-year chief of staff position for the mayor, the Salem News reports.
“White-out conditions” prevail: The Bay State Banner analyzes the racial make-up of Mayor Marty Wash’s cabinet appointments and is not impressed.
Walsh talks to Peter Gelzinis about addiction.
NATIONAL POLITICS/WASHINGTON
Corporate tax havens such as Bermuda are costing states hundreds of millions of dollars in lost tax revenue, Governing reports.
A House panel says there won’t be a squadron of commercial drones in the air by 2015 with the FAA unlikely to meet the congressional mandate for the agency to develop regulations governing the use of non-military unmanned aircraft.
Slate’s Matt Yglesias says that Obamacare reduces employment in the same way that Bill Gates would kill jobs by giving a county full of Maine residents $1 million each: “Employment may decline, in other words, not because people are going to get fired but because people will be pickier about working. Some are going to be unhappy about this. Owners of Wendy’s franchises, for example….”
ELECTIONS
The “Mitt in 2016” bandwagon rolls on.
Scott Brown has shocking news about the five signs you’ll get Alzheimer’s disease! Gail Collins calls Brown’s potential New Hampshire Senate run the best “when-the-heck-did-you-move-here controversy since we lost Liz Cheney from the Wyoming race.” But closer to his (former) home, Joan Vennochi says Democrats in New Hampshire underestimate him at their peril.
As Rep. Joe Kennedy III gears up for his first reelection campaign, the state GOP doesn’t know if it will offer a challenger.
BUSINESS/ECONOMY
The backers of a medical marijuana dispensary approved in Fairhaven will distribute $100,000 in grants to the town and local nonprofits with plans to increase that amount yearly.
HEALTH/HEALTH CARE
Communities across the state are seeing a spike in heroin overdoses, the Globe reports.
ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT
Power plant closings across New England create the potential for future shortfalls of electricity, the Associated Press reports.
The former head of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission says the nation’s power grid is vulnerable to attack and says he believes an unsolved incident at a California substation last year was a terrorist attack.
Boston is going wimpy when it comes to snow storms, reports the Globe, which found downtown all but deserted yesterday.
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
A UN panel criticizes the Vatican’s handling of clergy sex abuse, but the Globe’s new interpreter of all things Catholic Church-related, John Allen, says the panel may be undercutting its effectiveness by wading into other issues like abortion, same-sex marriage, and contraception.
MEDIA
The New Bedford Standard Times will no longer print letters to the editor or op-eds disputing the scientific evidence of climate change.
Former Red Sox pitcher and now ESPN analyst Curt Schilling announces he is battling cancer, the Associated Press reports.
