Short answer: From 2022 to 2024, 7,240 US community pharmacies closed and 4,178 opened, a net loss of 3,062. The storefront is the part that makes the news. The part that hurts is quieter: when a pharmacy closes, a lot of people simply stop refilling their medication.
What the new study found
A study in the Journal of the American Pharmacists Association (Blankenship, Murphy, Rodis et al., published online October 2026) counted every community pharmacy that opened or closed from 2022 to 2024, using the NCPDP pharmacy database. Drug Topics reported it on November 7.
- 7,240 closed, 4,178 opened, a net loss of 3,062.
- Chains lost 2,680 locations, independents 382.
"Pharmacy deserts will expand," Douglas Hoey, CEO of the National Community Pharmacists Association, told Drug Topics in 2025.
The real cost: people stop refilling
The best evidence on what a closure does to patients is a 2019 study in JAMA Network Open by Dima Qato and colleagues. It followed more than 3 million adults 50 and older who filled a statin. In the three months after their pharmacy closed, the share of days people had their statin on hand fell by about 6 percentage points compared with people whose pharmacy stayed open, and the gap was still there a year later. It fell further for people whose closed pharmacy was an independent, or who lived where pharmacies were scarce: about 8 points.
That's the line we care about. A statin that goes unrefilled doesn't make headlines. It shows up years later as something worse.
Distance isn't always the problem. A 2026 JAMA Health Forum study followed where prescriptions went after a major pharmacy chain closed stores in 2025, and how far patients then had to travel. "Several miles can create a hardship, and some will simply not go," said Sai Veeramachaneni, one of the authors, in a University of Mississippi release.
Your prescription got sold with the building
Here's the part we think is wrong. When a pharmacy closes, its prescription files are usually sold to another pharmacy. Patients mostly find out by text, after the fact: one Rite Aid customer told Scripps News he got a message saying his prescriptions had been "securely transferred" to a pharmacy he never chose.
A prescription is a decision you and your doctor made. It shouldn't move like inventory in a liquidation. Where it gets filled should be your call, not a line item in somebody's asset sale.
What the studies don't tell you
The new study counts storefronts, not patients. The 2019 adherence study is about heart medications in adults over 50, so other medications and ages may look different. None of these break down by state.
If your pharmacy closed (or might)
- Your prescription still exists. Any pharmacy can take a transfer, refills included.
- You can say no to the default. If your files were sent somewhere you didn't pick, you can move them again.
- Don't let the closure become a gap. If you're down to your last week of pills, ask the new pharmacy to fill it now, before you sort out the rest.
- Consider mail order for daily medications if the drive is the new problem.
- Check the price at the new place. Cash prices for the same drug vary a lot between pharmacies.
Where Temi fits
We built Temi on the idea that the patient picks the pharmacy. When you renew a prescription with Temi, a licensed clinician reviews it and it goes to the pharmacy you choose, local or mail order. If that pharmacy closes or can't fill it, you can move it from your order page, and our care team calls or faxes when a pharmacy needs it. Pharmacies will keep closing. Your prescription shouldn't close with them.
