Last week, a blistering opinion piece on The New York Times editorial page focused on the coziness of the relationship between the American Cancer Society and Walgreens.
The piece initially triggered criticism by ACS officials, but then—with no fanfare whatsoever—the society’s CEO called on the drug store chain, as well as others, to stop selling tobacco products.
ACS isn’t spinning this as a reaction to criticism, a change in policy, or a concession to critics. The policy continues to be what it has been, officials say. Yet, the letter specifically mentions the society’s benefactor Walgreens by name in a very public forum.
“The society, a leader for decades in scientific research and public education efforts focusing on the lifesaving effectiveness of tobacco control measures, has encouraged CVS and Walgreens to give up tobacco sales throughout the course of our relationship with both companies,” Seffrin wrote in a letter to the editor on the Times’ opinion page. “Walgreens—and all pharmacies—should stop selling tobacco, and we firmly believe that we will get further faster by working with the pharmacy industry rather than against it to end tobacco-related death and suffering.”
Seffrin’s letter was published a week after Peter Bach, a pulmonologist who directs the Center for Health Policy and Outcomes at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, wrote an editorial stating that the ACS reputation as “a vanguard of tobacco control efforts makes its support of Walgreens particularly sanitizing.”
Bach argued that the society’s financial ties with Walgreens contributed to its reluctance to challenge the retailer publicly. When a group of health organizations wrote an open letter to all drug retailers urging them to follow the example of CVS and stop selling tobacco products, ACS didn’t sign on, Bach noted.
Bach was unable to find out exactly how much Walgreen had contributed to ACS, citing donor privacy. Seffrin’s letter in the Times provides at least a part of the answer: last year, Walgreens raised over $6 million for ACS by prompting its retail customers to consider giving $1.00 to the charity, Seffrin disclosed.
“Bach would have us believe that those acts of generosity from its customers somehow bought Walgreens our permission to continue selling tobacco, but that could not be further from the truth,” Seffrin wrote.
ACS has repaid Walgreens with awards and accolades to its chief executive for the company’s smoking cessation programs for employees and other progressive public health moves.
Next week, for example, Walgreens CEO Greg Wasson and his wife Kim will co-chair the ACS Discovery Ball, a massive fundraising event in Chicago.
But as tobacco control is transformed by CVS’s decision to stop selling tobacco products—with the Walgreens competitor possibly forgoing an estimated $2 billion in profits—anti-smoking groups see the potential for making all drug store chains kick tobacco. Walgreens, with more than 8,500 retail outlets, is the next big target.
Some on the outside have been asking whether ACS was using its access to Walgreens to push the drug chain away from the product. The society continues to make assurances that it’s doing just that, but the answer isn’t publicly known beyond that.
Robert Youle, vice chair of the ACS board, said the society will continue to pursue its strategy of not confronting partners publicly. However, Youle cited Seffrin’s letter to the Times as an illustration of the society’s public stance against the sale of tobacco.
“I don’t see how you can be any less ambiguous than that or any more public than that,” Youle said. “I suppose we could have dragged it from an airplane over every city in the country, but I doubt our donors would want us spending their money that way.”
Youle’s conversation with The Cancer Letter appears on page 1.
Bach responded on Twitter, saying “@AmericanCancer to @Walgreens: stop selling cigarettes. But will society still take their $$’s?”
“Basically the society thinks it can cleanse the proceeds of tobacco sales it gets from Walgreens by putting those funds to good use, maybe,” Bach said to The Cancer Letter.
“But that doesn’t justify the society promoting Walgreens as a place of health and wellness. They use cigarette sales to attract customers. How about the society adopts a clear and consistent policy: The American Cancer Society won’t take money from tobacco wholesalers, manufacturers or retailers, and they won’t celebrate the people who run those companies.”
The stakes are high all around.
