CVS agrees to $875,000 settlement with state
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- November
- 10
  State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced today that he reached an $875,000 settlement with CVS Pharmacy Inc. over the sale of expired products in New York, including milk, eggs, medicines and baby formula.Â
  CVS, which has about 432 stores in the state, has agreed to implement specific policies and procedures aimed at preventing the sale of expired products and train employees in identifying and removing the products from shelves. The chain has agreed to post notices reminding customers to check expiration dates in the aisles in which over-the-counter drugs, infant formula, milk and eggs are sold. Any store that fails a compliance check will pay a penalty of $2,500.
“New Yorkers should not have to worry that their neighborhood
pharmacy is selling expired over-the-counter drugs that may be harmful to themselves or their families,” Cuomo said in a statement. “Today’s settlement with CVS and our past settlement with Rite Aid —which total approximately two million dollars—send the message that companies have a responsibility to put the safety of their customers ahead of boosting their profits.”
  The agreement is the result of a statewide, undercover investigation of all major drug-store chains in New York. Cuomo’s office found that 142 CVS and 112 Rite Aid stores in more than 41 counties sold expired products—60 percent of CVS stores and 43 percent of Rite Aid stores. Investigators found that some items at CVS stores were being sold more than two years past expiration dates.
  Subsequent investigations by Cuomo’s office showed that both chains continued to sell expired products, despite the attorney general’s advisory. The office reached a $1.3 million settlement in December 2008 with Rite Aid, which had about 710 stores in New York at the time.
   The settlement brings an end to a lawsuit Cuomo filed against CVS Pharmacy Inc. for “pervasive sales of expired products and its breach of a prior settlement with the Attorney General in which it agreed to take measures to end such sales,” according to the attorney general.
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 at 1:02 pm by Cara Matthews.
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Cuomo and Schumer should be appointed Joint Public Consumer Advocates, replacing Betsy Gotbaum. They should, however, be precluded from any higher political office in keeping with the tenets of the Peter Principle.