https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2024/01/why_are_thousands_of_pharmacies_closing.html
Why are Thousands of Pharmacies Closing?
American Thinker, by James Stansbury
Posted By: DW626, 1/26/2024 5:32:35 AM
About five years ago the only pharmacy in my small town in rural Virginia closed. A year or so later a second county drugstore failed. Soon the owner of the last remaining drugstore in the county was unable to make a profit and had to sell. (These last two managed to reopen at a later date.) I was unaware the loss of our drugstores was a nationwide trend until reading an article by Karen Kerrigan, president and CEO of the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council. She reported that mom-and-pop drugstores in rural areas were particularly hard hit, leaving about 630 rural communities with no pharmacy by 2018.
Also, there's been a continuous trend to automate the medicine dispensation machine. The liability that pharmacists have is immense, and mistakes still happen.
Amazon and CVS (IIRC, or another pharmacy) have been partnering to use algorithmic pharmacists. With Artificial Intelligence, I have no doubt that this trend is accelerating. I take great pity on people in pharmacy school, who sought it as a "last refuge" career in the modern economy.