The CVS Pharmacy logo is displayed on a sign above the CVS Health Corp. store. in Las Vegas, Nevada, February 7, 2024
Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty Images
Pharmacy staff at two CVS Rhode Island retail stores voted to join the fresh association National Pharmaceutical Association on Friday, signaling growing momentum in the movement to assist thousands of U.S. pharmacy workers address what they consider unsafe working conditions.
Pharmacy workers at 24-hour locations in Wakefield and Westerly won union elections, making them the first stores to unionize under CVS.” home state– according to the union’s announcement. The ruling comes a month after CVS Omnicare’s Las Vegas pharmacy — which is not customer-facing — became the first location to join the union, known as Pharmaceutical Guild.
A group of employees will represent them in negotiations with CVS.
“These are the first brick-and-mortar stores in the CVS model” to join the union, Shane Jerominski, a community pharmacist and co-founder of The Pharmacy Guild, told CNBC. “This is where my heart is… we all worked for this Walgreens or CVS in a classic retail environment, so we all know the working conditions there.
Nine of the company’s approximately 30,000 U.S. pharmacists work at both locations, a CVS spokesman said in a statement to CNBC. They noted that about 700 CVS pharmacists are already unionized with other groups.
A spokesman said the company respects the right of its employees to form or refrain from forming a trade union. They added that the vote is the first of several stages in the collective bargaining process.
If the National Labor Relations Board confirms the results, “we will negotiate in good faith with the union to try to reach an agreement,” the CVS spokesman added.
They said the company strives to ensure “appropriate levels of staffing and resources” in its pharmacies, using a “combination of staffing, hours, workflow process and technology” to do so.
Jerominski and other organizers of the nationwide pharmacy workers’ strike last fall partnered with IAM Healthcare, a union representing thousands of health care workers, to launch The Pharmacy Guild in November. The work stoppage affected major drugstore chains such as CVS, Walgreens and Aid in ordinancesand brought widespread media attention to workers’ concerns.
The Pharmacy Guild aims to assist pharmacy staff address what many workers call unsafe staffing levels and increasing workloads across the industry, putting both workers and patients at risk. The union is also calling for legislative and regulatory changes to establish higher standards of practice in pharmacies to protect patients.
The unionization effort reflects years of growing dissatisfaction among retail pharmacy workers, who say they often struggle with staffing shortages and rising work expectations imposed by company management. Many employees said the Covid-19 pandemic has only exacerbated these problems, and fresh responsibilities such as vaccinations and testing have further reduced the burden on pharmacy staff.
Jerominski said the Pharmacy Guild sees growing momentum in other parts of the country. He added that there could be more union filings involving non-CVS stores in the next few weeks.
