Investigators find expired medications at drug stores in New York

An investigation by Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo's staff in New York has found expired items in pharmacies across the state. The items included milk, eggs, infant formula, and common medications. The investigation took place in March, April, and May and included about 1,000 locations of several drugstore chains, turning up more than 600 expired products. Expired items were found at 60% of CVS stores and 43% of the Rite Aid stores visited in the probe.

A CVS spokesman issued the following statement, "We value the trust our customers have placed in us to sell them products that are safe and effective and the findings of New York's Attorney General are unacceptable to us. Our policy is to remove items before they go beyond the expiration date. We will work aggressively to ensure that our review and removal procedures are followed consistently in all of our stores. While we did not receive formal notification from the Attorney General until this afternoon, we will cooperate fully with his Office in this matter."

A Rite Aid spokeswoman said, "We take the allegations in the New York Attorney General's letter very seriously. Our policies have always been to not have outdated products on our shelves. As soon as we got that letter, which was shortly before the news conference yesterday, all stores mentioned in the letter to have had outdated products sometime between March 28 and May 13-that was the date of the stores on our list-were told to make sure that there is no such product on the shelves now. We are checking products in all of our stores nationwide and are retraining our stores on our procedures and policies regarding these matters."

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