Walmart will close numerous health centers and telehealth operations due to exorbitant operating and reimbursement costs, the major retailer announced Tuesday.
Since 2019, the company has opened 51 one-stop health centers. Each center is located next to a Walmart Supercenter located in five states.
Walmart originally said its goal was to have more than 75 clinics across the country by the end of this year, where patients can receive dental, medical, and behavioral health services such as X-rays and deep teeth cleanings.
“This is a difficult decision, and like others, the difficult reimbursement environment and increasing operating costs have created a lack of profitability and made the long-term care business unsustainable at this time,” the company said in a blog post Tuesday. “I’m doing it,” he said.
The company did not say how much money it invested in building the clinic.
Walmart also wouldn’t say how much revenue these clinics generated.
The company also did not say how many jobs would be eliminated as a result of the move, but added that employees affected by the closures would be allowed to move to other Walmart or Sam’s Club stores.
Walmart said it will continue to operate thousands of pharmacies and vision centers across the country.
The retailer’s move into primary care was prompted by intense competition in the rapidly growing multitrillion-dollar health care industry, where chains like CVS and Walgreens are also expanding their footprint.
Last year, Walmart reportedly considered acquiring a stake in ChenMed as part of its strategy to attract customers enrolled in private Medicare.
Walmart isn’t the only company struggling to get a bigger slice of the pie as insurance premiums soar.
Walgreens, which paid $5.2 billion to acquire leading healthcare provider Village MD, announced it would close 160 of its Village MD clinics in retail stores.
Last quarter, Walgreens announced a $5.8 billion writedown related to VillageMD.
Walmart also announced it would be shutting down MeMD, a telemedicine service it acquired at the height of the 2021 pandemic.
Demand for telemedicine services plummeted after the end of coronavirus-related mitigation measures that allowed people to see doctors in person.
The Post has reached out to Walmart for comment.
