--- title: Can CVS Really Say Its Ban Cut Cigarette Sales By 1 Percent? | TIME description: CVS claims its decision last year to stop selling cigarettes has benefitted public health. But is the company's study misleading? canonical: https://time.com/video/IrcKWF7T/ og:title: Can CVS Really Say Its Ban Cut Cigarette Sales By 1 Percent? og:description: CVS claims its decision last year to stop selling cigarettes has benefitted public health. But is the company's study misleading? og:url: https://time.com/video/IrcKWF7T/ og:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/IrcKWF7T/poster.jpg?width=720 og:type: video.other twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Can CVS Really Say Its Ban Cut Cigarette Sales By 1 Percent? twitter:description: CVS claims its decision last year to stop selling cigarettes has benefitted public health. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: Can CVS Really Say Its Ban Cut Cigarette Sales By 1 Percent? [Watch (HLS stream): Can CVS Really Say Its Ban Cut Cigarette Sales By 1 Percent?](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/IrcKWF7T.m3u8) (1:46)  _Published 2015-09-03. CVS claims its decision last year to stop selling cigarettes has benefitted public health. But is the company's study misleading?_ --- Jul 27, 2023 6:46 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [New York Bans Sale of Flavored E-cigarettes, the First State in the U.S. to Do So](/video/ibRNnpSR/) ### New York Bans Sale of Flavored E-cigarettes, the First State in the U.S. to Do So [Could Russia Ban Cigarettes?](/video/kYdZYHnT/) ### Could Russia Ban Cigarettes? [See Who Really Runs The US Cigarette Game](/video/xw2mozmS/) ### See Who Really Runs The US Cigarette Game --- ## Transcript One year ago, CVS Pharmacy stopped selling tobacco to help Americans quit smoking. But many were skeptical that CVS could really change anything. So CVS released its own study, claiming the company's ban was linked to 1 % drop in total cigarette purchases in 13 states. According to CVS's findings, its ban meant 95 million less packs were sold in those 13 states. And that group of 13 was selected because CVS's market share in the retail pharmacy industry was greater or equal to 15 percent in those states. The companies chief medical officer said in a statement. This new data demonstrates that CVS Health's decision to stop selling tobacco did indeed have a real public health impact. But while most agree that it was a good move for the health focused chain to quit selling a product that causes health problems, the ideology is questionable. The study used 32 monthly measurements Before the store banned tobacco sales, but only eight monthly measurements post ban. An average and a finding based on only eight measurements is fairly insignificant. Second, only three states were in the study's control group, and And in CVS's group of thirteen other things changed in those states beyond CVS not selling cigarettes during those eight months. One professor told Time, " if you look across these 13 states, there were tax increases for cigarettes going on, some of the states had anti- smoking programs, there was less smoking in movies. CVS doesn't account for those other factors. And finally the company says the change had a positive effect on public health but because it's not a controlled experiment, you can't say which variable influenced the other. So it may be CVS's ban helped reduce cigarette sales nationwide. Or, maybe, a reduction is sales nationwide just reinforce CVS's ban. 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