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Craig Burridge, Executive Director of the NYS Pharmacists Society, testified Wednesday during the Assembly budget hearing telling the panel of lawmakers that local community pharmacies may be a thing of the past in NYS….

We have lost 7500 jobs in pharmacy. I have two chains that are on the bubble, if they go out that's over 1,000 pharmacies that will close. We only have 3947 retail pharmacies in New York. Probably about half of our independents will go. We're expected to lose 54,000 jobs and about a third of our network.

Burridge asked lawmakers to follow the Senate's lead and pass a measure that would increase reimbursements to pharmacy owners. The measure is sponsored by Mohawk Valley Assembly Democrat RoAnn Destito.

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As many as one-third of New York's independent, community pharmacies could close by the end of the year if the state doesn't come to the rescue, according to Craig Burridge, executive director of the state Pharmacists Society. Burridge told lawmakers at an Assembly budget hearing Wednesday because of lower reimbursement rates from the state, it just doesn't pay for the neighborhood pharmacist to stay in business anymore….

To fill a prescription, it costs $10.80 to hand the bag over to a Medicaid recipient and if they don't pay the $3.00 co-pay, you end up with 90 cents for a $100 drug with this program. 90 cents. It barely pays for the container the drug is in. Just because pharmacy wasn't mentioned in the cuts, it's a silent killer and we're closing on a daily basis.

300 neighborhood pharmacies have already closed across the state in recent months.