I am thinking of buying them at walgreens, has this issue been resolved?
I've experienced a lot of problems at that chain too, but it was an issue between the chain and the issuer. It was a pain to resolve, but others have not had as much problem (could have been a district issue at that time... haven't returned to that chain to attempt again).
Regarding recent problems, it seems like the card activates (receipt shows that), but then at some point it deactivates. Caution.