F or years, Donna Adams could glide from her Nubian Square apartment to the Walgreens on Washington Street in her electric wheelchair. It was so close, she said, that “in the wintertime, you didn’t even need a coat.” When her go-to pharmacy closed in 2022, Adams started riding the bus to the Walgreens on Warren Street, about a mile away, for her blood pressure medications and grape-flavored Jolly Ranchers.
In January, that pharmacy closed, too. Now in her 70s, Adams takes the bus another 20 minutes to a Walgreens on Columbus Avenue, enduring further strain on her aging joints. “It’s not convenient,” she said.
“And it’s not acceptable.” Her anger has rippled through Roxbury the past six months, since the Warren Street storefront became the fourth Walgreens to shutter in predominantly Black and Latino areas of Boston in two years. Protesters picketed in parking lots, waving signs that read, “Hell No!” Residents and public officials alike demanded the company change course.
The Rev. Miniard Culpepper, a community advocate, skewered the drugstore giant for leaving customers “high and dry.” More than a protest, it was a cry for help — one that echoed across Massachusetts, to little avail.
Advertisement Since 2017, at least 26 pharmacies have closed in Boston, and about 200 shuttered statewide, according to data from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. State estimates show that a comparable number have since opened, though they rarely serve th.