Remembering community pharmacy’s finest hour

“It may come to be remembered as community pharmacy’s finest hour.”

That was the first sentence of the lead article on page 1 of the Sept. 26, 2005, edition of Drug Store News. As we closed this issue, the nation was reflecting on the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, and I have been racing to finish a presentation I will be delivering in another country. The topic: How the U.S. retail pharmacy industry has been transformed over the last decade, from just a dispenser of prescription medicines into an integral part of our nation’s healthcare system at the center of healthcare delivery in every community, helping to solve for the two biggest issues facing health care in America — access and affordability.



And although I don’t have one slide in my deck about it, the way this industry came together to bring critically needed medications and aid to the areas devastated by Katrina was the first time our country really got to see the larger role community pharmacy could play in public health.



“More than any single event in modern history, it showcased not only pharmacy’s willingness to put professional needs of patients ahead of profits, but also the industry’s ability to respond to disaster more quickly than any federal agency in the early days,” Drug Store News reported at the time.



The event triggered a massive and coordinated campaign among chain and independent pharmacy operators that provided an unprecedented level of cooperation among competing companies, pharmaceutical makers and the major drug wholesalers. Pharmacy teams from different companies worked together side by side in mobile pharmacy worksites in major evacuation centers in places like Kelly Air Force Base and the Houston AstroDome. “Saving lives took precedence over competitive issues or financial considerations like reimbursement,” DSN reported.



There were a lot of heroes from our industry — far too many to name them all here. But the pharmacy leaders who responded to Katrina “actually demonstrated more about the value of community pharmacy infrastructure than anyone else could have explained in a lifetime,” Larry Kocot, head of KPMG’s new Center for Healthcare Regulatory Insight — who was then special assistant to administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Mark McClellan — told DSN. And on the 10th anniversary of one of the biggest natural disasters in American history, DSN tips its hat to every member of the industry who put patients before profits in those terribly dark hours.