While it is currently unknown how many jobs in Pennsylvania will be affected, a round of layoffs last year cut nearly 160 jobs in the state.
About 3,000 CVS employees will soon lose their jobs after the pharmacy giant confirmed the layoffs via spokesperson.
The company says it will affect roughly one percent of the company’s workforce. According to the spokesperson, jobs impacted will “be primarily corporate roles.”
It is still unknown how many of the 2,900 positions being eliminated are in Pennsylvania. The company said it intends to file a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification notice with Rhode Island, where CVS is headquartered, next week. The notification is required by law when a company is planning to either close facilities or lay off employees.
When CVS announced layoffs last year that affected 5,000 workers, 157 Pennsylvanians were affected. In 2021, CVS announced it would be closing 900 stores over the next several years.
This week’s layoff announcement follows CVS’ plan earlier this year to cut $2 billion in costs after the company’s insurance division Aetna experienced financial struggles. It’s also been rumored that CVS will “separate its retail and insurance businesses.” CVS and Aetna merged in 2018.
While CVS did not cite the increase in retail theft as a reason for the layoffs, retail pharmacies have been feeling its effects recently. Some believe part of the reason Walgreens announced a “significant” number of store closures earlier this year and Rite Aid’s bankruptcy announcement is retail theft. CEO of the American Pharmacists Association Michael D. Hogue believes the store closures were because of retail theft, saying “our profession can no longer ignore retail theft or push it off as a simple cost of doing business.”
Just last month, a pharmacy in West Philadelphia was broken into as two suspects stole prescription drugs and cash.
