Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc., Wins PETA Award for Hot-Car Warning Signs

For Immediate Release:
September 13, 2021

Contact:
Megan Wiltsie 202-483-7382

Deerfield, Ill. –

A Compassionate Business Award is on its way from PETA to locally based Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc., for warning the public about the dangers of leaving animals and children in parked cars. Walgreens’ sign appears on electric vehicle stations at its 450 locations nationwide—and across the pond, its U.K.-based pharmacy chain, Boots, is displaying the signs at 32 stores and the same message on its “Health & Beauty” website. The warnings follow discussions with PETA.

“Even ‘quick errands’ can end in tragedy, since temperatures inside parked cars can soar to triple digits within minutes,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “By answering PETA’s call for warning signs, Walgreens Boots Alliance is helping to prevent animals and children from enduring terrible heatstroke deaths.”

This year, the heat-related deaths of 48 companion animals have already made the news—and countless more have suffered and died out of the public eye. Anyone who sees an animal or a child in a parked vehicle should take immediate action: Write down the color, make, model, and license plate number, and rush to have nearby stores page the owner of the car—and if the owner can’t be found, call the local humane authorities or the police. If they’re unresponsive, do whatever it takes to save the individual’s life. PETA offers an emergency window-breaking hammer for intervening in life-or-death situations.

Walgreens Boots Alliance joins a long list of companies—including Walmart, CVS, and Albertsons, which owns Safeway—that have warned customers about hot cars this year. It will receive a framed certificate and a box of delicious dog-shaped vegan chocolates from PETA in thanks.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.