The ABC11 I-Team in collaboration with the television stations owned by ABC has uncovered 45% of the postal codes across the country, and does not have a pharmacy, which creates several ‘pharmacy deserts’.
North Carolina has an average of three pharmacies every 10 square miles. However, more than 90 percent of the provinces in the state report even less.
Wake County is home to four times the number of pharmacies in Granville County, where Gary Bowman has operated a professional pharmacy for nearly 30 years.
“We’re proud to know who our customers are and call them by name. We’re the same people who go out to dinner with them, who go to church with them, who go to league games with them,” Bowman explained. .
As an established and trusted health worker, Bowman said people now turn to him for advice and news about the COVID-19 vaccine.
“Oh, a lot of calls. ‘Do you have the vaccine? Are you going to have the vaccine? When can I get it? Can I get on a list?’,” He said.
It is one of nine pharmacies in the country with more than 60,000 inhabitants.
Bowman said over the years, two other independent pharmacies have closed.
Stephanie Kiser, a pharmacist and director of Rural Health at UNC, said there is fear of more closures.
“When we see that pharmacies are close by and we see that people have to travel further to gain access to a pharmacy that feels unfamiliar and that often does not encourage the trust of the provider-patient relationship that they would like,” she explained.
Closures in rural areas also lead to greater gaps in access between urban and rural communities.
With 46 pharmacies every 10 square miles, Mecklenburg County has the most pharmacies in the state. While Mecklenburg County is also one of the most populous areas, it has 2,300 times more pharmacies in the same space compared to Northampton County, where there are only two pharmacies every 1,000 square miles.
Although these inequalities have existed for decades, they are having more serious consequences today.
“We really recognize the value of these pharmacies in these small communities that are the closest place to getting a vaccine,” Kiser said.
Transport and distance to a vaccine can be another obstacle for people who are not 100% on board the COVID-19 vaccine.
“Driving across the province for older adults, it’s a very long journey, they do not want to undertake the journey,” Kiser explained. “The thought of getting in the car and having to drive 20 kilometers can be a big deterrent.”
Unfortunately, these pharmacy deserts mostly exist in rural communities where an older population lives.
The ABC11 I-Team also discovered many of the zip codes without having a pharmacy in communities with higher levels of poverty and where residents of Black and Latino live. A finding that makes the COVID-19 vaccine more difficult to obtain for poorer residents of Black and Latino; the same communities that are already disproportionately affected by the virus.
Russell’s Pharmacy and Shoppe opened in East Durham two years ago to meet this exact need.
“You’re looking at a historically marginalized area, there are a lot of people who do not have that much transportation, they do not have so many ways to access, to just drive down to the CVS or Walgreens or the Walmart, so they have something needed in the community that is very close to them and to which they have access, “said dr. Darius Russell, the pharmacist manager and owner, said.
The nearest pharmacies to his business are both chains and are 30 minutes walk away.
Russell said he offers the community a chance to build relationships and trust with his patients; a ratio that can help with the vaccination of COVID-19.
“Having a pharmacy in the area really helps build trust so people don’t feel like I’m just going to a big conglomerate. ‘I’m actually going to a place where I know they’re going to tell me the truth, they’re really going to tell me what I need to hear,’ ‘Russell said.
Although pharmacists like Russell are in a good position to give the COVID-19 vaccine, they are not yet part of the vaccination process in North Carolina.
“They are a little frustrated because they feel they can make a difference in their community if they have access to the vaccine,” said Dr. Penny Shelton, executive director of the North Carolina Association of Pharmacists, explains.
Just as there are levels to be vaccinated, the state has levels about who can provide the vaccine and when. Pharmacists are currently in fourth place, a position that many are waiting for doses in February or March.
“The biggest challenge at the moment is the supply. It is insufficient to help local pharmacies, whether you are rural, suburban or urban, with the vaccination of patients who have the stock and that the supply is currently being allocated, to a “Broader distribution by supporting our state and not just North Carolina and other states as well,” Shelton said.
Kiser works with other health experts across the state, pointing to West Virginia as a model for North Carolina.
With more than 80% of the doses administered, West Virginia is ranked at the top spot in the US for the distribution of vaccines, according to the latest vaccine data from the CDC. More than 11% of state residents over the age of 16 received the vaccine; a percent beat only through Alaska.
Kiser and others say a large part of the state’s success is because they have given pharmacists, especially rural pharmacists, vaccines to distribute.
“If you’re going to focus on older adults and you really want to improve access, pharmacies have to depend on my kind of top line, because there are already people in every community of our state who often have a relationship with their pharmacist and their community pharmacist. , ”Said Gina Upchurch, executive director of Senior PharmAssist.
Her non-profit organization helps seniors from Durham to pay for, access and manage medicine. Now, like many others, the group has become a source of vaccination for residents.
Upchurch said although it is a waiting game everywhere, it is even more difficult to get answers in rural areas.
‘I wish my parents now live in Durham County. My parents live in Rockingham, ‘she said. “I depend on their pharmacist to get the vaccine … They feel comfortable with him, he will come out to the parking lot and give it to them, and it works well for my parents, but it’s just a waiting game.”
Russell and Bowman also play the waiting game; undergo intensive training, and learn the processes of the state, while hoping to receive allotted doses soon.
Both pharmacists said they need to invest time and money to become a future vaccine. Many rural independent pharmacies that have called ABC11 have said they will not offer the vaccine.
“It was not just, ‘Okay, I want the vaccine, so send it to me,'” Bowman explained. “We had to go through a lot of training and a lot of processes to make sure we were set up to go through it adequately and that was important. I wanted to be a website where people could come and be vaccinated.”
Shelton said while North Carolina was waiting for more supplies, several groups in communities had formed a brainstorming session for creative partnerships to increase access to the vaccine.
Earlier this month, the state Department of Health announced the $ 2.5 million grant to provide free transportation to vaccination sites.
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