South Windsor (CT) Considers Banning Cigarette Sales in Pharmacies

NBC Connecticut ^

[matt04]

When the South Windsor town council meets on Monday night, they will consider an ordinance that would ban the sales of tobacco products at CVS.

In July Town Councilor Dr. Anwar Saud, who specializes in lung diseases and critical care medicine, proposed banning the sales of tobacco in pharmacies.

Nationally, there is a problem, he said in video posted on the town's Web site.

Some large pharmacies, which run “minute clinics,” sell cigarettes, while smaller, community pharmacies do not allow cigarette sales, he said during a council meeting over the weekend.

“So they are becoming healthcare facilities … but, as soon as you enter the facility, the first thing you that you can see most of the time is cigarettes being sold, and there is a trust factor for people in the community that they go to a facility, they are talking to a pharmacist, they are trying to seek advice from what type of medicines , what dose to use and then is what is being prescribed, and at the same time, at the same facility, same place, cigarettes are being sold, ” he said.

Some major cities prohibit pharmacies from selling cigarettes, he said.

“People have the right to sell whatever they want, for the most part, but I think we need to expect a little bit more from ourselves and this community,” he said.

Mayor Tom Delnicki said in July that he finds cigarette smoking “disgusting” but has concerns about an ordinance on a single business that bans a legal product.

“At what point do we run into the slippery slope, cigarettes today, Slurpees tomorrow, Big Gulps the day after that?,” Delnicki said.

[matt04]

It sounds like South Windsor is targeting CVS, the only pharmacy in towns that sells Cigarettes. If this passes, the night before it goes into effect CVS should close as normal. Then when the customers are gone, bring a few semis in and remove all merchandise, registers, etc from the store.

Board up the windows and put up a nice banner to the town saying "We've gone Gault. Enjoy less jobs, less tax revenue and a boarded up building."

[goseminoles]

CHS isn’t necessarily a pharmacy. They just have one in the store.

[goseminoles]

CVS .. Damn auto correct..

[Dr. Sivana]

"We've gone Gault. Enjoy less jobs, less tax revenue and a boarded up building."

[matt04]

Oops. *Galt.

[muir_redwoods]

I know Tom Delnicki pretty well and he and most of the republicans that dominate the town council would be unlikely to vote for this. Saud is a democrat and they are in the minority.

[JoeDetweiler]

Smokers could learn a lot from Muslims.

[Vigilanteman]

Let's suppose, just for a moment, that we buy in to the nanny state assumption that smokers are just a bunch of self-destructive helpless boobs who need this type of regulation from their betters.

Where is a smoker more likely to get help:

1. A full service CVS drug store which has a staffed walk-in clinic and also sells a large variety of smoking cessation aids?
   
2. Or the local liquior store which will sell him the smokes and the lotto ticket no questions asked?

[ExCTCitizen]

Who is running South Windsor, now the DEMS?? When I moved, the Republican (really RINOS) ran it!!