Vermont
Increasing pharmacy closures mean long drives for Vermont residents, mirroring a national trend – VTDigger
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Hardwick’s sole pharmacy — a Walgreens that had twice been hit by Vermont’s recent summer floods — closed for good at the end of September. Since then, residents have had to drive 25 minutes to access a pharmacy in Morrisville or 40 minutes to the closest Walgreens in Lyndon, leaving Hardwick squarely in a “pharmacy desert.”
Pharmacy deserts are generally defined as places where there is no or limited access to a pharmacy. In rural areas, this means the closest is over 10 miles away, while in urban areas, the closest is over one mile away.
Hardwick is hardly the only pharmacy desert in the state. According to a recent analysis of pharmacy locations across the country, 41 of Vermont’s 193 census tracts (21%) had low access to a pharmacy in 2022. The analysis, published by the academic journal Health Affairs Scholar, defined low access as at least one-third of the tract’s population living within a pharmacy desert. Between closures of independent pharmacies and national chains continuing to scale back back “less profitable” operations, the number of pharmacy deserts is only increasing.
Mike Fisher, Vermont’s chief health care advocate, said that pharmacy closures across the state are an ongoing and “very serious” trend.
“I live in Addison County,” he said. “When the local Marble Works Pharmacy closed, I remember just how upsetting and difficult that was for so many people.”
According to the state’s Board of Pharmacy, 28 Vermont pharmacies have closed permanently over the past five years, leaving 126 currently operating in the state. A nationwide study has linked such closures to a decline in older Americans taking their prescription cardiovascular medications.
Often, Fisher said, there’s another pharmacy in town, as in Middlebury. But in a growing number of towns, there isn’t.
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According to a study published this month in the journal Health Affairs, more pharmacies closed than opened between 2018 and 2021 both nationally and in Vermont, with independent pharmacies and those located in Black and Latinx communities a higher risk for closure.
Options for those living in a pharmacy desert do exist. In Hardwick, area residents can utilize mail-order pharmacies for their prescriptions and Kinney Drugs offers weekly deliveries. However, Fisher notes, pharmacies don’t solely dispense medications, but also vaccines and advice.
“The pharmacist at the local pharmacy counter is an accessible, front-line healthcare professional that many people depend on,” he said. “You lose something really important when you lose your community pharmacist.”
Marty Irons, a full-time Vermont pharmacist for almost two decades and a member of the Vermont Pharmacists Association’s board, said in an email that the organization is very aware of pharmacy closures and expects them to continue to impact Vermont.
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Pharmacists largely attribute closures to pharmacy benefit managers: companies that act as intermediaries between drug manufacturers and insurance companies. In Vermont, two pharmacy benefit managers — CVS Caremark and Express Scripts — account for 95% of Vermont’s drug market for commercial health insurance plans, according to the state Attorney General’s Office.
Pharmacy benefit managers, often abbreviated as PBMs, are known to under-reimburse pharmacies for the costs of filling prescriptions. According to Irons, this loss of income often requires pharmacies to pull back on services — such as the number of hours they’re open — and, in some cases, close.
“Negative, or below cost, reimbursement is no longer the exception,” Mike Duteau, president of the Vermont Association of Chain Drug Stores, said in an email. “The growing impact is so substantial that pharmacies are closing in larger numbers and more quickly.”
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In addition, Irons and Duteau point to staffing challenges only exacerbated by the closure of Vermont’s only pharmacy school three years ago.
The Legislature passed a bill this year to regulate PBMs, the system for which is currently being set up at the Department of Financial Regulation, Fisher said. The bill requires PBMs to obtain a license from the department, strengthens its oversight and bans some of the companies’ practices.
In addition, Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark announced a lawsuit against PBMs earlier this year, alleging that the state’s two major PBMs skim money from drug transactions. However, it is unclear how — and how soon — these two state efforts might improve the situation for pharmacies and their customers.
“Our Vermont pharmacy infrastructure is so fragile,” said Irons. “Most people assume it will always be there; I hope so!”
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Vermont
Annual Vermont Home Show creates connections
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ESSEX JUNCTION, Vt. (WCAX) – The Annual Vermont Home Show wrapped up on Sunday.
“It has been a good show so far. It is a hit or miss with how busy it gets. I think the biggest thing is just getting our name out there,” said Richie LaFond from the Energy Co-op of Vermont.
LaFond spent his Sunday talking to lots of people about saving money and cutting back on fossil fuels. The company he works for specializes in heating peoples homes and in times like these the best way to connect with customers is at events like this.
“Right now we are having a tough time just because there is some uncertainty about the new president. As far as where the rebates are going to go. Are they still going to be here. But you are starting to get a lot of people that are starting to think about cutting their bills a lot,” said LaFond.
The Vermont Home Show has been a tradition for many years, this year hosted by Jenks Productions. About eighty vendors show off their products from landscape design, home re-models, banks & mortgage companies, energy efficient heating systems and more.
A thousand plus people came to the event hoping to save some money.
“There is rebate programs that you don’t really know about. They are obviously more educated than I am on some of those things. Being able to find out what programs are actually out there to help get things done,” said Greg Lang from Chittenden.
The show was once managed by a different company and went into a Covid hiatus during the pandemic. Jenks says they hope the event grows in the future.
“We have had some really positive feedback. Everybody remembers what the show was a long time ago. We are just looking to re-build it,” said Wes Jenks of Jenks Productions.
Copyright 2025 WCAX. All rights reserved.
Vermont
Afghans helping Afghans: Case workers in Burlington outline their struggle to respond to federal funding freeze – VTDigger
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BURLINGTON— At 17, he was on the front lines in Afghanistan, shoulder to shoulder with foreign soldiers, fighting America’s longest war.
Now he is a case worker at the Vermont Afghan Alliance teaching new refugees how to drive and helping with translation and interpretation.
Originally from Herat in Afghanistan, Hamed Noorzai didn’t know how to drive when he arrived in the United States in October 2023. But when he saw a driving instructor job advertised by the alliance, he applied. Then he hopped into the Toyota Corolla the alliance uses for training, learned the ropes and got his license.
Since then he has helped roughly 40 people secure their driver licenses in Vermont.
That driving program stalled last month in the aftermath of a Jan. 21 White House memo freezing federal funding for refugee support.
“Since then, we’ve faced a rollercoaster of uncertainty,” said Molly Gray, executive director of the Afghan Alliance, a small Burlington-based nonprofit. “We’ve had to prepare for a future where we go without federal funding. We’ve had to revise our budget for 2025, let a staff member go, and urgently seek new sources of funding.”
The organization, which started in 2022 as a scrappy volunteer-led effort with locally raised dollars, was one of 15 nationwide to win a three-year $256,000 Ethnic Community Self Help grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in 2023. That money helped open an office, hire Afghan program officers and provide direct services to the Afghan community statewide, Gray said. The alliance now has seven paid staff offering services ranging from English and driving lessons to training on legal rights and citizenship. And, Gray estimated, it has helped more than 200 of the estimated 600 Afghans relocated in Vermont.
The Trump administration’s recent halt on refugee arrivals from Afghanistan and Pakistan and the funding freeze represent “a shameful, systematic abandonment of those who risked their lives in support of U.S. military and diplomatic missions,” Gray said in an email today.
She learned of the funding freeze when she tried to log into the federal payment management system on Jan. 28.
They weren’t able to access the system for three weeks, she said Thursday. Access has since resumed thanks to a temporary restraining order put in place by a federal court judge in Rhode Island. A hearing on the case — in which Vermont is a plaintiff along with more than 20 other states — took place Friday, though the judge’s order is not expected immediately.
Meanwhile, the future is uncertain for initiatives such as the driving program, which helped 35 Afghans get their licenses last year, 10 of whom were women.
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On the front lines
For Noorzai, the Trump administration’s actions are a slap in the face. But he chose his words carefully during an interview this week. He talked about honor. And he talked about betrayal.
“I was a good fighter. I was translating Taliban passwords in radio chats,” he said. His work on the frontlines in Kandahar helped save dozens of American lives, he estimated.
Afghans like himself supported America for two decades so helping the Afghans who have made huge sacrifices and are here now would be the honorable thing for America to do, he said.
Noorzai, 32, didn’t finish school and his family didn’t know he had joined the military. And it was his American brothers in the military who helped him escape after the country was overtaken by the Taliban, he said.
He said he loves his American friends. That feeling doesn’t extend to the current federal government.
He once dreamed of being a doctor. Someday he hopes he can follow that dream. For now, Noorzai said he is happy he is helping other Afghans improve their lives and take a step towards independence by learning how to drive in Vermont.
His colleague at the Afghan Alliance, Drukhshan Farhad, also takes deep pride in the work she does to help fellow Afghans. Again, it is not without some conflict.
“There are days when I think, is my work really helping people or am I making them co-dependent,” said the 27-year-old program officer.
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“Then there are days where I’m like, oh my goodness if I got hit by a truck today, how many people will lose their minds tomorrow? Because their livelihood depends on me. Basically, I am their eyes and ears, sometimes in the most important ways,” she said.
This includes something as mundane as sorting through their mail to weed out important notices from junk mail, she said.
Originally from a small village in Badakhshan in northeast Afghanistan, Farhad came from a progressive family, didn’t cover her head, went to study alone in Kabul at 17, and attended the American University there which involved going through multiple checkposts daily during the war. There was an outer wall riddled with bullet holes, she recalled, and sometimes they had to pause lessons because of the gunfire raging outside.
A brilliant student, Farhad recounted the many hurdles she overcame to come to the United States on a full scholarship at Norwich University in August 2017. She was the first and only female student from Afghanistan there, she said.
Far away from home and family, the news of the fall of Kabul in August 2021 “felt unreal,” she said, as her family moved to Pakistan to escape the Taliban.
In 2022, she helped the university organize an international event on campus to celebrate Nowroz, the Afghan New Year, as vice president of intercultural student organization on campus. It involved kite flying, henna, Afghan food and music. That’s where she met Gray, Vermont’s former lieutenant general, who would later hire her to work at the alliance
When Gray received news of the federal grant in September 2023, she called Farhad because she knew she would need someone with strong language and translation skills.
Fluent in English, Dari and Pashto, Farhad now helps with interpretation, translation, case management and leads the alliance’s legal rights training and community engagement programs.
Now Farhad’s work is potentially at risk.
“So we now have to move forward without those funds, or at least presume that we will not have consistent access to them,” Gray said.
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‘An incredible ambassador’
Sayed Yassin Hashimi, a case worker at the alliance, said it’s always a good feeling to help people, especially, his own.
Last year he closed 92 cases which included helping to connect new Afghan refugees to jobs, English lessons, driving classes. He also helped create a free tax filing clinic and a program through which the alliance can serve as an intermediary between an employer and a new Afghan employee if a problem arises.
Hashimi, 29, was one of many U.S. allies in Afghanistan when Kabul fell to the Taliban in August 2021. “That was like the darkest night in my life,” he recalled.
With an undergraduate degree in political science, journalism and English literature from an Indian university, Hashimi said he dreamed of being an ambassador to help bring peace and democracy to the world. Originally from Bamyan in central Afghanistan, he helped the U.S. embassy as an interpreter during the war. But that night changed everything.
After months of terror — including the Taliban showing up at his house in Kabul in an effort to track down those who had been helping the U.S. government and being separated from his large family — Hashimi escaped to Washington D.C. in June 2023.
Three months later he moved to Georgia, Vermont for a job at Perrigo, a manufacturer of infant formula. While a far cry from his dreams, Hashimi said he was glad to take it to support his family, who, by then, had fled to Pakistan. “I did not have any other choice,” he said.
Months later he spotted a case worker job at the alliance, applied and joined the organization in January 2023.
“Yassin is an incredible ambassador for the organization and he is also extremely entrepreneurial. When he sees a need in the community, he finds a way to create a program to address the need,” said Gray.
Hashimi said he doesn’t know what to think about the federal freeze and the recent attacks on the country’s most vulnerable under the new Trump administration.
“I think the existence of this organization is a must for this community, and that’s why we are trying our best to keep running and to maintain our existence here in Vermont,” he said.
Noorzai recalls how hard it was for him to navigate a new country and culture, especially with limited language skills. The new Afghan refugees will be lost without help, he said.
“If there is no resettlement agency, they will face lots of problems, especially those Afghans that cannot speak English. It will be like leaving them in the middle of a jungle with nothing,” he said.
Farhad doesn’t know what the future holds for her but she does know that she likes what she is doing. She knows people depend on her and because of that she said she cannot give up.
“I would fight till my last breath to keep things going — like this program,” she said.
Vermont
Vermont H.S. sports scores for Saturday, Feb. 22: See how your favorite team fared
The 2024-2025 Vermont high school winter season has begun. See below for scores, schedules and game details (statistical leaders, game notes) from basketball, hockey, gymnastics, wrestling, Nordic/Alpine skiing and other winter sports.
TO REPORT SCORES
Coaches or team representatives are asked to report results ASAP after games by emailing sports@burlingtonfreepress.com. Please submit with a name/contact number.
►Contact Alex Abrami at aabrami@freepressmedia.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter:@aabrami5.
►Contact Judith Altneu at jaltneu@gannett.com. Follow her on X, formerly known as Twitter: @Judith_Altneu.
SATURDAY’S H.S. GAMES
Boys basketball
Games at 2:30 p.m. unless noted
Milton at Missisquoi, 1:30 p.m.
St. Johnsbury at Champlain Valley
Rivendell, NH at Northfield
U-32 at Mount Anthony
Oxbow at Richford
Middlebury at Enosburg
Winooski at Twinfield/Cabot, 4 p.m.
Spaulding at North Country, 6:30 p.m.
Burlington at Rice, 7 p.m.
Girls basketball
Games at 2:30 p.m. unless noted
Essex 52, Mount Mansfield 49
E: Colleen Sonnick 17 points. Alexa Rabidoux 10 points. Reese Gregory 8 points.
M: Aly Dorman 20 points.
Lyndon 49, Randolph 35
L: Kendall Hale 15 points. Aryanna Parker 13 points. Ella Marshia 7 points.
R: Ella Messier 16 points. Kaleigh Jarvis-Chabot 11 points.
Blue Mountain at Hazen, noon
Harwood at U-32, noon
Winooski at Stowe, 12:30 p.m.
Richford at Northfield 1 p.m.
Burlington at South Burlington
Richford at BFA-Fairfax, 3:30 p.m.
Peoples at Lake Region, 5:30 p.m.
Boys hockey
North Country at Stowe, 4:15 p.m.
Woodstock at Brattleboro, 4:45 p.m.
Spaulding at Burr and Burton, 5 p.m.
South Burlington at BFA-St. Albans, 5:30 p.m.
Mount Mansfield at Milton, 5:30 p.m.
Colchester at Champlain Valley, 5:40 p.m.
St. Johnsbury at Harwood, 7 p.m.
Missisquoi at Burlington, 7:30 p.m.
Essex at Rice, 7:55 p.m.
Girls hockey
Missisquoi at Rutland, 11 a.m.
Essex at U-32, 2:30 p.m.
Hartford at Burlington/Colchester, 5 p.m.
Spaulding at Middlebury, 5 p.m.
Burr and Burton at Harwood, 5 p.m.
Rice at Champlain Valley/Mount Mansfield, 5:15 p.m.
Brattleboro at Woodstock, 6:45 p.m.
SUNDAY’S H.S. GAMES
Girls basketball
Rice at Champlain Valley, 12:30 p.m.
Danville at Twinfield/Cabot, 3 p.m.
MONDAY’S H.S. GAMES
Girls hockey
Burlington/Colchester at Spaulding, 4 p.m.
Missisquoi at Brattleboro, 3 p.m.
Boys hockey
North Country at St. Johnsbury, 4:45 p.m.
Girls basketball
Games at 7 p.m. unless noted
Twinfield/Cabot at Stowe, 11 a.m.
Northfield at Winooski, 6 p.m.
Spaulding at Randolph, 6 p.m.
Lake Region at North Country, 6:30 p.m.
Williamstown at Blue Mountain
Lamoille at Lyndon
Mount Mansfield at South Burlington
Peoples at Harwood
BFA-St. Albans at Champlain Valley
Vergennes at Colchester
Essex at Rice
Thetford at U-32
Montpelier at Oxbow
Milton at Mount Abraham
Enosburg at Middlebury
St. Johnsbury at Burlington, 7:30 p.m.
(Subject to change)
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