As prescription demand outpaces COVID vaccination decline, CVS raises expectations
After processing additional prescriptions and gaining hundreds of thousands of new members for its health insurance division in the first quarter, CVS Health raised its yearly prediction.According to the company’s earnings report released on Wednesday, the number of prescriptions filled during the first three months of the year increased by 5.1 percent on a 30-day equivalent basis when compared to the same period in 2017. This increase was “primarily driven by increased utilization and the impact of a weaker cough, cold, and flu season experienced inside the prior year,” the company stated.
Offering a nationwide extra COVID booster shot are CVS, Rite Aid, and Walgreens.
Additionally, since the end of last year, its health insurance firms have gained 674,000 new members. However, the firm said that largely as a result of medical expenditures reverting to normal levels, their adjusted operating income fell somewhat in the first quarter.
On May 15, 2020, a sign advertising drive-through coronavirus (COVID-19) testing will be up at a CVS Pharmacy in Bridgewater, Massachusetts. Getty Images ((Image by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images))
Nevertheless, these elements somewhat compensate for the decline in coronavirus vaccination and diagnostic tests.
Even while the business gave out more than 8 million COVID-19 vaccinations in the first quarter, this is still a big decrease from the 20 million it gave out in the last quarter of 2021, when consumers requested boosters and many youngsters started receiving the injections.
In the first quarter, CVS also conducted 6 million tests, a decrease from the more than 1.2 billion COVID-19 tests performed in the final quarter of 2021.
However, when the omicron spike of the virus crested at the beginning of the quarter, clients buying more tests gave the company’s drugstores a boost.
Net income for the third quarter increased by 89% to $2.31 billion. However, operational revenue decreased as a result of a $484 million deal the business negotiated with the state of Florida to end lawsuits over opioids.
Overachieving Wall Street’s forecast of $75.54 billion, revenue came in at $76.8 billion. The business stated that it now anticipates this year’s profits per share to range between $8.20 and $8.40.
