A Milwaukee health center is opening its own retail pharmacy Monday, October 26, offering comprehensive prescription care to anyone who walks in — not just its own patients. Progressive Community Health Centers says the new pharmacy, called Progressive Community Rx, will begin filling prescriptions at 8 a.m. on the lower level of its Lisbon Avenue Health Center at 3522 W. Lisbon Ave.
The pharmacy will offer prescription fills and refills, prescription transfers, over-the-counter health products, pharmacist consultations and vaccinations, according to reporting from BizTimes Milwaukee. It will operate Monday through Friday and is open to the general public, not just patients of the health center. Progressive Community Health Centers itself describes the new service on its website, saying comprehensive prescription care begins “Monday, October 26 at 8:00 AM,” available “on the Lower Level of the Lisbon Avenue Health Center.”
Candice Cole-Smith, CEO of Progressive Community Health Centers, said opening the pharmacy creates another door to care, according to BizTimes. Board chairman Quentin Prince said the organization wants to grow, innovate and expand access to quality healthcare, the outlet reported.
A Federally Qualified Health Center Filling a Growing Gap
Progressive Community Health Centers is a federally qualified health center based in Milwaukee, a status that qualifies it for funding under Section 330 of the Public Health Service Act and enhanced Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement, per BizTimes. The organization runs three neighborhood centers in the Milwaukee area, according to its own website, which describes services including primary care, behavioral health, dental care and walk-in appointments. Its other two facilities — at 1452 N. 7th St. in Hillside and 945 N. 12th St. in the Aurora Sinai Hospital complex — offer medical services but do not include pharmacy services, BizTimes reported.
The new pharmacy arrives as Milwaukee has lost pharmacy access across multiple neighborhoods. Walgreens has closed eight stores across Milwaukee over a three-year period, reducing its local footprint by roughly 25%, according to BizTimes. CVS also closed a pharmacy in Milwaukee the previous year. BizTimes reported that the closures were driven by corporate restructuring, low insurer and government-program reimbursement rates, and retail theft, and have affected many lower-income neighborhoods on the city's north and south sides.
Pharmacy Deserts Hit Milwaukee's Black Neighborhoods Hardest
The pressure on pharmacies isn't unique to Milwaukee. Nationwide, pharmacies have experienced rising backend costs and falling reimbursements from pharmacy benefit managers, BizTimes reported. The three largest PBMs managed 79% of prescription drug claims for 270 million people in the United States in 2023, according to KFF, which notes that spread pricing and lower reimbursement levels can put financial pressure on pharmacies.
A 2021 study found that about 60% of Milwaukee neighborhoods that were majority Black or segregated Black neighborhoods were pharmacy deserts, compared with less than 18% of white neighborhoods, according to TMJ4. The station reported that the study identified Milwaukee as one of the eight U.S. cities with the worst disparities in proximity to pharmacies. Nationally, researchers found that 9,654 U.S. pharmacies — about one in eight — closed between 2009 and 2015 despite an overall increase in the total number of pharmacies, per the University of Illinois Chicago. That research also found independent pharmacies in both urban and rural areas were three times more likely to close than chain pharmacies, and that pharmacies serving disproportionately uninsured or Medicare and Medicaid patients in urban areas were twice as likely to close as others.
Other Milwaukee Nonprofits Have Stepped Into the Void
Progressive Community Health Centers isn't the first Milwaukee nonprofit to fill a pharmacy gap left by a retail chain's exit. Sixteenth Street Community Health Center opened a pharmacy at 1032 S. 16th St. in December 2024 after a Walgreens closure on the city's south side, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. That pharmacy filled around 275 prescriptions daily during its first month, with an average of 350 to 400 on Mondays, and neighbors do not need to be patients at the clinic to fill prescriptions there, though it lacks a traditional shopping section for over-the-counter medications, the newspaper reported.
The Journal Sentinel's reporting also traced the closure that preceded that pharmacy's opening: a Walgreens at South 27th Street and West National Avenue shut down in November 2024. Separately, WISN reported on the planned closure of a Walgreens at 27th and North Avenue, the eighth such closure in the city in three years, with prescriptions set to transfer to a location two miles away at 35th and Wisconsin. The station noted the closure raised concerns about the growing risk of pharmacy deserts in Milwaukee.
Hayat Pharmacy has also expanded in response to the trend, opening a location at 1238 South 16th Street in the Walker's Square neighborhood. That pharmacy offers prescription and over-the-counter medications, vaccinations, in-home medication distribution, medication packaging and counseling, and provides customer service in 29 languages, according to its CEO and founder, per the same Journal Sentinel coverage. The Walker's Square location is open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and closed on weekends. Progressive Community Rx now joins that growing list of community-based pharmacy options as Milwaukee residents continue to navigate a shrinking retail pharmacy landscape.
