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Another CVS practice that disproportionally affects communities of color is the chain’s lockup of condoms. Condoms are one of the best defenses against unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS,  but CVS makes it difficult for people of color to obtain them. At hundreds of stores across the country in areas where people of color predominate, CVS displays condoms in locked cabinets that require customers to summon CVS staff to unlock them and then monitors customers while making their selections. CVS is less likely to lock up condoms in areas with fewer residents of color, and the chain’s two main competitors do not lock up condoms.

A survey of CVS stores conducted between September 2007 and January 2008 found that condom lockup in CVS stores is a widespread practice. The table below displays the number of stores that lock up condoms in six of the largest cities in the United States. In each city, CVS locked up condoms in 12 percent to 85 percent of surveyed stores.

The proportion of CVS stores that lock up condoms increases with the percentage of residents of color in the stores’ zip codes as shown in the table. In all six cities, the percentage of stores locking up condoms in zip codes where people of color are the majority was higher than the proportion in zip codes with white majorities. In five of the six cities, the share of CVS stores with locked condoms is more than three times higher in majority people of color areas than in majority white ones.

The disparity looms larger in zip codes with the highest concentrations of white residents (more than 90 percent white) and of people of color (less than 10% white). In all six cities, CVS locks up condoms in at least half of all stores in areas with the highest concentrations of people of color. In Houston, Philadelphia and New York City, not a single store in the “whitest” zip codes lock up condoms.

CVS Store Locations with Locked vs. Unlocked Condoms by Percent people of Color

The public health implications are broad. These cities are among the metropolitan areas with the largest HIV-positive populations and AIDS infection rates. Five of the cities in the above table are in the metropolitan areas with the largest number of AIDS cases reported in 2006.  For example, New York City has more than 100,000 residents living with HIV, and 1 in 70 is estimated infected.   HIV and AIDS infection rates are also much higher among people of color – the very populations that CVS targets with condom lockup. Nationwide, although 13 percent of the population is black,  African Americans comprise 49 percent of the AIDS diagnoses in 2006 (the most recent year of data).  The Michigan Department of Community Health estimates that the rate of HIV infection is “almost eight times higher [among African Americans] than the rate among whites.”  And in Miami-Dade County, where nearly 24,000 adults live with AIDS, 58 percent of AIDS cases reported in 2007 were among Blacks although only 20 percent of the area’s population is black.

CVS says that it decides where to lock up condoms "based on whether shoplifting is to such a degree that they're becoming unavailable for customers to purchase."  Yet CVS’s two largest competitors – Walgreens and Rite Aid – have corporate policies against condom lockup. 

Images: Locked Condom Cases at CVS Stores