Subsequent events	9 Months Ended
	May 31, 2021
Subsequent Events [Abstract]
Subsequent events	Subsequent eventsOn June 1, 2021, the Company completed the previously announced sale of the majority of the Company's Alliance Healthcare business as well as a portion of the Company’s retail pharmacy international businesses in Europe, per the Share Purchase Agreement with AmerisourceBergen. See Note 2 Discontinued Operations for further information. The Company estimates the fair value of the proceeds from the Transaction to be approximately $6.8 billion to $6.9 billion (subject to net cash and working capital adjustments), the gain before currency translation adjustments to be approximately $1.0 billion to $1.1 billion and net gain on disposal to be approximately $0.3 billion to $0.4 billion. As of the date of this report, the Company has not completed the calculation of net gain on disposal of discontinued operations and therefore estimates presented are subject to further refinement and may result in changes.