eType Editor

Arkansas is at the center of a national battle between local pharmacies on the one hand, and on the other hand a giant industry known as Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs). It is a battle of economic life and death.

We’ve got a bike-a-thon coming up Saturday and all the profits will go to St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital in Memphis. Youngsters are urged to ask parents, grandparents, and other adults to sponsor them… even five cents per mile would help… then report to East First street at 9:30 Saturday morning. The bikers will ride the full length of First Street, all the way from Highway 62 to the end of Lee Drive. The round trip is two miles. There will be certificates to all bikers who turn in money, T-shirts for riders collecting $30.00 or more and T-shirts plus sports bags for those turning in $75.00 or more. Plus, there will be a special gift… a brand-new bicycle… to the boy or girl, age 12 and under, who turns in the most pledge money by Friday, May 1. Boy, I wish an opportunity like that had come along when I was growing up… I always loved to ride a bicycle, even though I never had one to call my very own. When we were in Elementary School my brother and I had a partnership bicycle and that was nothing but around-the-clock bickering. It go so bad that mom laid down the rules… we were to take turns by the day and on his day, no matter if he was or was not riding his bike, I was not to touch it and the same went for him on my days. Being the older and a little wiser, he soon figured out that he could ride the bike until dark on his day, give it a coat of paint and it would be noon before the paint would dry on my day.