CVS Health to lay off almost 3K, mainly in corporate ranks

Oct. 1, 2024 / 

On Tuesday, CVS Health announced the pharmacy chain will lay off nearly 3,000 workers. “We’ve embarked on a multi-year initiative to deliver $2 billion in cost savings by reducing expenses and investing in technologies to enhance how we work,” a CVS spokesperson said Tuesday. File Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI | License Photo


Oct. 1 (UPI) -- CVS Health announced Tuesday the pharmacy chain will lay off nearly 3,000 workers as part of cost-saving efforts, but the job cuts primarily will be in "corporate" positions, the company said.

"We've embarked on a multiyear initiative to deliver $2 billion in cost savings by reducing expenses and investing in technologies to enhance how we work," a company spokesperson wrote in a statement to multiple newsrooms.

The company said the affected positions are "primarily corporate roles," Mike DeAngelis, CVS' executive director of corporate communications, said.

These "reductions," as he called them, will "not impact front-line jobs" in CVS stores, pharmacies or distribution centers," stated DeAngelis.

The 2,900 CVS layoffs represent less than 1% of the chain's workforce.

"Our industry faces continued disruption, regulatory pressures, and evolving customer needs and expectations," DeAngelis said.

"So it is critical," he continued, "that we remain competitive and operate at peak performance."

Laid-off CVS employees, he said, will receive severance pay and benefits.

This new round of jobs cuts at CVS Health, which operate a network of pharmacies across the U.S. among other businesses, adds to the roughly 5,000 other layoffs announced last year in August.

In 2021, CVS Health closed roughly 900 stores between 2022 through this year. At the time, the closures represented nearly 10% of the company's then-10,000 locations.

CVS joins the likes of the another pharmacy chain, Walgreens, which announced plans in June to close a "significant portion" of its "underperforming" 8,500 U.S. stores at the time.