In April, the corporate behemoth that started life as the Consumer Value Store celebrated its 60th birthday with a costume party. Karen Lynch, the CEO of what is now CVS Health, asked her top executives to attend a town hall dressed in 1960s fashion. Some opted for tie-dye, some opted out. Lynch herself enthusiastically embraced the brief, donning the white go-go boots and pillbox hat of a Mad Men–era flight attendant.
But while Lynch was cosplaying as a woman with little professional power, she was celebrating the latest acquisition in her career as a health care mogul. She joined CVS in 2018 when the pharmacy chain paid $70 billion to buy Aetna, the insurance giant that now covers about 37 million Americans. Since becoming CEO of the combined company in 2021, Lynch has spent another $19 billion on primary care and home health care businesses, betting that CVS can profit by directly owning doctors’ groups.
