Former President & Chief Executive Officer, CVS Health
CVS Health CEO Larry Merlo on plans to roll out Covid-19 vaccine
CVS Health CEO Larry Merlo joined "Squawk Box" on Thursday to discuss how the company is preparing to rollout the nationwide distribution of the coronavirus vaccine once it receives emergency-use authorization. "We'll be in those long-term care facilities in the first 24-48 hours upon receipt," Merlo said. "We've got 10,000 of our dedicated healthcare professionals that are ready to go and they are excited to be an important part of the solution." For access to live and exclusive video from CNBC subscribe to CNBC PRO: https://cnb.cx/2NGeIvi
CVS Health Chief Executive Larry Merlo said the com...
About Larry Merlo
Larry Merlo, former President and CEO of CVS Health, stated that the company was prepared to begin administering COVID-19 vaccinations within 48 hours of receiving a vaccine allocation. He said that CVS had been working with Operation Warp Speed and the CDC, and that the company's first involvement would be in long-term care facilities, with 10,000 healthcare professionals ready to administer the vaccine. Merlo also noted that CVS had conducted over seven million COVID-19 tests and had built mobile kiosks to bring testing to underserved communities. Merlo discussed CVS Health's acquisition of Aetna, describing it as an opportunity to create a new healthcare platform that is simpler and less expensive for consumers. He said that the combination of CVS and Aetna would allow the company to become more of a healthcare destination, addressing chronic disease management and reducing overall healthcare costs. Merlo also addressed the opioid crisis, stating that CVS would "vigorously defend" its actions and that the company was not "on the hook" for the crisis.
Transcript (9 segments)
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Becky Quick0:00
Larry, this is a historic moment. We are awaiting this news we have been waiting for some sort of hope, and this seems like it might be it. But the daunting task of trying to ramp up and get ready to distribute this seems pretty extreme too. Tell us what you've been doing to prepare for this. How are you laid out? How quickly are you prepared to start giving these vaccinations to Americans?
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Larry Merlo0:25
Well Becky, good morning and thanks for having me. It is an exciting day. We have been working with Operation Warp Speed for the last several months, and the military personnel have just been absolutely fantastic to work with. They're apolitical, they're materials and logistics experts, and I couldn't be more pleased with the transparency, the engagement, and the planning dialogue that we've been able to have. It's that, Becky, that gives me the confidence that we will get this done. Our first involvement is going to be with the long-term care facilities. You've heard General Gus Perna from Operation Warp Speed talk about, pending EUA approval, vaccines will begin to go on the road 24 hours later. Upon our receipt of that allocation, we'll be in those long-term care facilities in the first 24 to 48 hours upon receipt, vaccines into the arms of some of our most vulnerable populations. We've got 10,000 of our dedicated healthcare professionals that are ready to go, and they're excited to be an important part of this solution.
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Becky Quick1:34
I know that you all have been looking to staff up, hire additional people, and I just wonder how that process is going. You've got 10,000 people you can already put out there, but obviously you're anticipating you're going to need more people. How do you hire those people? Where do you hire those people? And are these going to be CVS technicians who are going to places? Are these CVS Health people who are going into these long-term care facilities? How will you be doing this eventually in the actual CVS stores?
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Larry Merlo2:02
Well Becky, going to long-term care facilities and conducting clinics, that is something that is not new for us. We've been going to those facilities for several years now administering the seasonal flu vaccine. And Becky, we have been hiring individuals since this pandemic began. If you look at what we've done with testing, in the next week or so we'll be at nine million COVID tests administered in communities across the country, including many of our underserved communities where we've been able to bring access to testing to minority populations. So we're ready to go, we're in great shape, and as I mentioned, people are excited to be an important part of the solution.
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Becky Quick2:48
I'm guessing it's harder and harder to find these sort of qualified healthcare applicants to fill these jobs. Are you paying people more to do this? Where are you finding them? How are you deploying them just in terms of geographically across the country?
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Larry Merlo3:03
Yeah Becky, it's really been a combination of pharmacists, pharmacy technicians, pharmacy interns. We've worked with the pharmacy schools across the country. It's just another example, as well as individuals that in some cases they're active healthcare professionals from a licensure point of view, but they're retired. And they want to come back and again be part of the solution and pick up some part-time work. So again, we're ready to go.
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Becky Quick3:36
Larry, we've heard a lot of concerns about supply chain constraints. That's something that even people on Wall Street are worried about, that if this doesn't roll out smoothly there could be issues to it. And there are some technical issues just dealing with this vaccine that has to be kept at a very cold temperature. How are you kind of preparing for that? How are you trying to make sure that those hang-ups don't happen?
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Larry Merlo4:00
Yeah Becky, great question. As you look at the vaccine candidates, five of the six candidates that are in some phase of progression, they require, I'll describe it as, normal refrigeration or freezing that exists today across all 10,000 of our CVS pharmacies. It's the Pfizer vaccine that has the deep freeze requirements. We have been working with Warp Speed. That vaccine will be distributed in special thermal shippers, and those shippers can be re-iced every five days, three times, which gives it a life cycle of 15 days and then an additional five days under a normal refrigeration freezing capability. We're going to be using depot stores. We'll have about 1,100 of our CVS pharmacies that will receive the Pfizer vaccine. We'll work the supply chain with those requirements in mind, ensuring that all of those doses are administered within those required time frames.
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Shepard Smith5:05
Shepard Smith here. Thanks for watching CNBC on YouTube.