It’s finally happened: Amazon has announced its intention of entering the pharmacy business. With that announcement, the potential disruption of the retail pharmacy business in America has become, in an instant, a very real possibility.

Given Amazon’s well-documented ability to upset the settled order of things, coupled with the online retailer’s proven success rate in recasting the existing framework of events, retail pharmacy in the United States would do well to take Amazon’s announcement with the severity it deserves.

Wait. There’s more. It has become apparent in recent weeks that the global pharmaceutical community may well do what conventional wisdom said couldn’t be done: develop a vaccine that is effective in sharply reducing the incidence of COVID-19, if not eventually eliminating it entirely from the planet.

Suddenly, a new group of probables has replaced the old. The word “when” has become the question of the day. The likeliest response: sometime early next year — at the latest. Moreover, a secondary question has emerged as key to the survival of the world as we know it: How will it get into the veins of the world’s population? Or — of more immediate interest to those who toil in the vineyards of America — to the people in the 50 U.S. states. Forget the folly surrounding such fantasies as the U.S. military being called on to distribute the upcoming vaccine. We might as well, during the upcoming Christmas season, entrust the mission to Santa Claus.

No. Clearly, the logical method of distribution is through the nation’s wholesale and retail pharmacy communities. After all, have these two bodies not repeatedly demonstrated their efficiencies, their wisdom, their ability to get things done? Moreover, forget the daunting numbers. Forget the millions of people and the billions of doses we will need to meet future demands. As Sherlock Holmes once memorably put it: “Eliminate the impossible. Whatever remains, however improbable, must be the solution.” In the America of late 2020, what remains is the wholesale and retail pharmacy communities.

Where, you might reasonably ask, does Amazon fit into this equation? At this early juncture, that’s anyone’s guess. But Amazon has already proven, many times over, its efficiency at getting product into consumers’ hands efficiently and economically. Why should things be any different on this occasion?

So the gauntlet has been laid down. It’s reasonable to assume that the folks at Amazon believe that the traditional U.S. pharmacy community is vulnerable, riven by petty greed and needless competition. In this arena, Walgreens, the fable goes, is obsessed with CVS, while CVS, embarking on a new era with a new sense of purpose, is absorbed with guessing how supermarket pharmacy will react. And then there’s Walmart … the Beast of Bentonville can hardly be expected to take Amazon’s pending incursion lying down.

Against that backdrop, this is the perfect time for traditional pharmacy in America to demonstrate to itself — and to the world — what it’s made of. After all, we’re the big boys in this upcoming competition. It’s our basketball. We have the keys to the schoolyard. We have successfully kicked sand in the face of every impostor that has tried to come along and steal our basketball, take over the schoolyard, push us around. This time should, if we only have the gumption to assert ourselves, be no different.

So despite Amazon’s announcement, only two things should concern the wholesalers and retailers who control retail pharmacy today. The first would be to make the mistake of not taking Amazon seriously. Too many competitors have already made that mistake. Amazon should — must — be taken seriously. Anyone who has ordered merchandise from this online giant and watched, awestruck, when it turns up just hours later, and is exactly what was ordered, has learned that lesson.

The second lesson: Don’t give up or give in before the bell signaling round one has sounded. This is, after all, a heavyweight title fight. As such, it will go 15 rounds — barring an early knockout. And remember, we own the boxing gloves.