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Retail News Breaks Archives Drug stores raised their public visibility as health care providers big-time in 2009 with aggressive flu shot programs. This year, they're angling to go a step further. Rite Aid Corp. has successfully completed a debt offering and a refinancing of its revolving credit facility that were announced last week. Safeway Inc. has begun offering flu shots on a walk-in basis at its in-store pharmacies and through scheduled flu vaccine clinics at most of its other stores. Shoppers Drug Mart Corp. is offering extra bonus points on back-to-school purchases for loyalty card members. Rite Aid Corp. has launched its flu shot program, making seasonal flu vaccinations available at more than 3,000 of its pharmacy locations nationwide. Mike Cantrell has been promoted to the new position of president at AmerisourceBergen Corp.'s Good Neighbor Pharmacy network. Quality Food Brands Inc., a subsidiary of Synergy Brands Inc., has received what it called a "substantial order" for several of its grocery products from Rite Aid Corp. CVS Caremark Corp. may be onto something based on early findings from its ongoing behavioral research on consumer health care choices. Kerr Drug plans to deploy Mirixa Corp.'s MirixaEdge Web-based clinical platform to support the delivery of pharmacist-based patient care services, including medication therapy management (MTM). The National Community Pharmacists Association has submitted comments to a trio of federal agencies to emphasize patient choice and greater use of generic drugs as they devise criteria for maintaining Grandfathered Health Plan (GHP) status under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). Walgreen Co. is kicking off its influenza vaccination campaign, which it calls the most comprehensive flu shot program in the country. Tom Ryan, chairman and chief executive officer of CVS Caremark Corp., is slated to speak along with the heads of the Department of Health and Human Services and the Food and Drug Administration at a health care forum being held early next year by the University of Miami. CVS Caremark Corp. has entered the Omaha, Neb., market with the opening of its first two stores in the city.
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