The surge in positive cases of COVID-19 is leading to staffing shortages and weekend closures of some CVS and Walgreens pharmacies, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Friday (Jan. 14).
Supermarkets and some retailers — including Macy’s and Walmart — have also been forced to scale back their hours in the face of mounting COVID-19 positive cases across the U.S., according to the report.
Neither CVS nor Walgreens could say how many stores will close on a given weekend, as the numbers change every week and often happen with short notice to staffers and customers, the report stated. Some of the closures have left those scheduled for COVID-19 vaccines scrambling to find another solution.
A CVS spokesman told WSJ that “a small fraction” of its almost 10,000 U.S. stores are closing on one or both weekend days “to help address acute staffing issues amidst both the omicron surge and the workforce shortage affecting nearly every industry and company.”
A Walgreens spokeswoman told WSJ a vast majority of the chain’s 9,000 U.S. stores are open their regular hours.
“The ongoing labor shortage, combined with the surge of Covid-19 cases, has resulted in isolated instances in which we’ve had to adjust operating hours or temporarily close a limited number of stores,” she said, per the report.
On Tuesday, CVS Health raised its full-year earnings guidance Tuesday (Jan. 11) to reflect the uptick it’s seen in the need for its services with the most recent surge in sickness and virus contraction. It expects shares to range from $5.87 to $5.92, up from the previous projection of $5.50 to $5.61.
Read more: CVS Health Announces Elevated Earnings Outlook Amid Omicron Variant Spread
CVS handed out more than 50 million COVID-19 vaccines and about 29 million coronavirus tests since the pandemic started through the end of November. COVID-19 vaccines and tests have brought more than 32 million new customers into CVS stores.
Walgreens plans to open 100 new Walgreens Health Corner locations this year, having closed two acquisitions last quarter and now finalizing a third.
See more: Walgreens Focused on Growing Health Unit as Solid Int’l Results Complicate Sale of Boots Unit
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