West Des Moines-based GRX Holdings LLC, which owns 18 pharmacies in Central Iowa, today announced it has formalized a policy to not sell cigarettes or tobacco products at its locations, which include 16 Medicap Pharmacy locations. Micki Sandquist, Iowa Tobacco Prevention Alliance board member and executive director for the American Lung Association in Iowa, said she hopes that other pharmacies and retailers in Iowa follow the company’s example. The organization in November called on Hy-Vee Inc., a leader in the Healthiest State Initiative, to end tobacco sales, which the retailer declined to do. Medicap Pharmacy and another pharmacy that GRX owns, Wright Pharmacy in Stuart, have never sold cigarettes or other tobacco-related products, and those types of products were eliminated when GRX purchased Ward East Side Pharmacy in Des Moines in 2013.