Tobacco More Likely to Be Sold at Pharmacies in Poor and Latino Communities

A Rutgers study is first nationwide to analyze the geographic distribution of pharmacies selling tobacco

March 24, 2014
cigarettes

Tobacco products are more likely to be sold in pharmacies located in poor and Latino communities.

Poverty and the racial makeup of a community are a good indications of whether someone can go into the neighborhood pharmacy and find a pack of  Marlboro cigarettes for sale, according to a Rutgers study.The new research, published in GIScience and Remote Sensing by Andrew Peterson, an associate professor in the Rutgers School of Social Work, confirmed a disturbing trend: Tobacco products are more likely to be sold in pharmacies located in poor and Latino communities.
“Pharmacies are a critical component of the health care system and their role is contradicted by the sale of cigarettes,” says Peterson.“It is against the ethics of pharmacists to sell a product that is among the top preventable causes of death in the world.”
Peterson’s research, with former Rutgers doctoral student Cory Morton, involved a rigorous analysis of the geographic distribution of pharmacies selling tobacco products. The study combined administrative data, including pharmacy licenses and tobacco retail licenses, with U.S. census data and applied advanced geospatial analytic techniques to measure the relationship between people’s access to pharmacies that sold these products and their neighborhoods’ socio-demographic characteristics. The researchers discovered that the density of pharmacies selling tobacco is higher in poorer neighborhoods and Latino communities. Peterson’s team was the first in the country to do this type of analysis.
Peterson commends the recent landmark decision by pharmacy chain giant CVS Caremark  to ban the sale of cigarettes starting October 1 at its more than 7,600 stores, a decision that will cause the company to lose $2 billion in annual revenue.  As pharmacies increasingly position themselves as health care providers for everything from flu shots to in-store clinics, Peterson thinks CVS made a strategic business decision that it believe in the long run will be more profitable.

Andrew Peterson, associate professor with the School of Social Work
Photo: Nick Romanenko
Andrew Peterson, associate professor with the Rutgers School of Social Work

“They are also making a business decision to bet on the future of the health care industry rather than the future of the tobacco industry,” Peterson says. Peterson’s previous research indicated that while most pharmacists didn’t think that cigarettes and other tobacco products should be sold, two-third of pharmacies, mostly corporate owned, continued to earn billions in revenue in tobacco sales. Smaller, independently owned pharmacies, however, were more likely to choose to ban its sale.
The researchers’ next line of study will be focusing on what it will take for other pharmacies to follow the lead of CVS, and what communities can do to encourage a ban on cigarettes at their local pharmacies. Peterson and his research team have published seminal research about tobacco sales and pharmacies in publications including the Journal of Community Psychology and Journal of the American Pharmacists Association.
The team also reports that smoking rates are often lower in communities where there are fewer stores selling tobacco products.
“Cost is an important predictor of substance abuse, and higher costs are associated with a decline in use,” says Morton, who is a postdoctoral fellow with the National Development and Research Institute and supported by the National Institute of Drug Abuse, part of the National Institutes of Health.
“There is an increased search cost involved for the consumer who may now have to travel farther to get cigarettes,” Morton said. “The cost of gas and of his or her time gets added to the price of the cigarettes, actually making them cost more.”

Contact:  Beth Salamon, Communications Office, Rutgers School of Social Work, 848-932-5340, bsalamon@ssw.rutgers.edu

Big $$ in NJ Elections

NJ Spotlight, Mar. 24, 2014

Independent special interest groups, many of which operate with little or no public disclosure, have spent an estimated $63 million on gubernatorial and legislative elections in New Jersey since 1977, according to a new report by the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC).

“In federal, state, and even local races, independent spending has emerged as a dominant force in political campaigns,’’ said Joseph Donohue, Deputy Executive Director and the study’s author. “It’s a new ballgame, both nationally and in New Jersey.”

More than $55 million — 87 percent — has been spent just in the past five years, according to “White Paper No. 24 — Independents’ Day — Seeking Disclosure in a New Era of Unlimited Special Interest Spending."

The report also indicates that the 2013 gubernatorial and legislative elections attracted a record $39 million in so-called outside spending — campaign funds spent independently of parties or candidates by groups or individuals with special interest agendas.

Bill Would Require NJ to Rejoin Program to Curb Greenhouse Gases

NJ Spotlight

By Tom Johnson

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Credit: philly.com

The Legislature is once again trying to get the state to rejoin a regional initiative to curb the greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global climate change.

The Senate Environment and Energy Committee is scheduled to take up a bill (S-151) on Thursday that would require New Jersey to participate in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

In May 2011, Gov. Chris Christie unilaterally pulled New Jersey out of the 10- state effort to reduce pollution from power plants contributing to global warming. In doing so, the Republican governor said the program was not effective and simply imposed a new tax on utility customers.

The program, commonly known as RGGI, is a collaborative effort by the states to deal with climate change. Its proponents hope it will eventually serve as a model for a nationwide strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, a vision that has yet to be realized.

To encourage less pollution from power plants, RGGI imposes a tax on emissions of greenhouse cases, such as carbon dioxide. The funds raised by the tax are used by member states to finance clean-energy projects to reduce energy consumption.

To date, legislative efforts to force New Jersey back into the program have proved fruitless, with Christie twice vetoing bills to that end. Senate President Stephen Sweeney is the sponsor of the bill.

The bill said the funding of clean-energy programs by RGGI benefits consumers by reducing their costs and by decreasing energy use for both homeowners and businesses. The funds also would help promote the state’s efforts to achieve greater energy efficiency and implement cleaner ways of producing electricity, according to the bill.

Democratic lawmakers and clean-energy advocates have long been unhappy with many of the Christie administration’s energy policies. Besides pulling out of RGGI, the administration has diverted nearly $1 billion in ratepayer subsidies that were supposed to fund clean-energy programs, but instead have been used to plug holes in the state budget in the past several years.

More recently, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities killed the first offshore wind project to be considered by the agency, saying it was not financially viable and failed to provide economic benefits to ratepayers. It also adopted regulations earlier this month that may force Tesla, the maker of high-priced electric vehicles, to cease selling the cars in New Jersey.

“It’s good to get it out there,’’ said Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club, referring to Sweeney’s bill. “RGGI is a symptom of a broader anti-climate change agenda by the Christie administration.’’