Some Walgreens pharmacists plan temporary walkouts over working conditions

Oct. 9 (UPI) -- Pharmacists and other workers at some Walgreens stores across the United States say they are planning walkouts beginning Monday to protest what they call harsh working conditions they contend are compromising customer safety.

Organizers are planning the actions through social media channels such as Reddit and Facebook, since pharmacists and workers at the nation's major drug stores chains are not unionized.

It remained unclear how many stores would be affected by the planned walkouts, but employees at more than 500 of the approximately 9,000 Walgreens stores across the United States have expressed interest and solidarity in this week's effort, CNN reported.

One online focus of the walkout activity is the Facebook page of Oklahoma City pharmacist Dr. Bled Tanoe, who last year told KTUL-TV she left her job at Walgreens because what she called an intense workload cut into the time needed to check allergies and other factors to ensure safe prescriptions.

"I found myself to be in a place where I, the environment was not safe for my patients, you know, and I was constantly afraid to make a mistake with every script that I bagged," she told the broadcaster, adding that there is a "massive shift" of pharmacists and technicians leaving the profession "because of the environment where they practice."

Last week Tanoe wrote in a post, "It has been confirmed that many employees are planning to walkout next week: [Oct.] 9th, 10th and 11th."

On Sunday with the walkout looming, she posted a message to the public about what's motivating the actions.

"You see, for more than a decade, working conditions at your local CVS Health, Walgreens, Rite Aid Pharmacy and others have been unsafe. But with COVID, what was once a house on fire, became an entire neighborhood or even city on fire!" Tanoe wrote.

During the pandemic as pharmacists became personal and social lifelines for people isolated by quarantines, the essential workers were "still expected to continue to fill prescriptions, meet company profits-driven goals among other things. And yet, our burdens were not matched with the proper physical, emotional and even financial support."

Pharmacists, she claimed, "burned ourselves to the ground because we chose this profession. Meanwhile, companies like those big corporations, pocketed the revenues and made no attempt to meet simple requests such as less demands on us, better staffing, patient-centered values or even better pay for our technicians who were and are still very much underpaid," Tanoe said.

Chicago-based Walgreens had not issued an official statement regarding the planned walkout by Monday afternoon, but company spokesman Fraser Engerman told WSIL-TV in Harrisburg, Ill., over the weekend the healthcare giant is working to improve conditions for its pharmacists.

"We are engaged and listening to the concerns raised by some of our team members," said Engerman. "We are committed to ensuring that our entire pharmacy team has the support and resources necessary to continue to provide the best care to our patients while taking care of their own wellbeing.

"We are making significant investments in pharmacist wages and hiring bonuses to attract/retain talent in harder-to-staff locations," he said.