Life News.com is reporting that "Abortion advocates in Congress have introduced new legislation that would force pharmacists across the country to dispense birth control and the morning after pill, which can cause an abortion in some instances. Under the bill, pharmacists who decline to dispense such drugs could be required to pay as much as $500,000 in fines."
So much for choice. The mantra of choice is a fraud. They never meant it anyway. Don't agree with abortion advocates' choice, then you can pay. $500,000 in fines. These people are the new totalitarians.
What's next? If you are a pharmacist and don't fill a prescription for suicide, or a doctor and don't want to do an abortion, or a Catholic heath network and you don't want to provide coverage against your morals-I forgot, they already are forced to do that in California, you will pay fines for that too?
In Nevada, abortion advocates wanted to fine pharmacists $10,000 and take away their licenses. One pharmacist I spoke with in rural NV was the only pharmacist serving many thousands of people. He said he'd leave the state and he thought no one would come to take his place, especially with the national pharmacist shortage. But who cares about the needs of those thousands of Nevadans? Abortion advocates want what they want when and how they want it.
There is a choice.
ReplyDeletePharmacists voluntarily enter a well-regulated industry. They have a choice to get a new job if they are unable to perform the duties of a job they voluntarily choose.
The better argument is that the choice is not a meaningful one, given that it is their livelihood.
Some choice that is. Choose my way or the highway. We'll run you out and bankrupt you. That's the same as no choice. Pro-choice is a fraud. How did any movement get that sick?
ReplyDeleteOne could argue for discipline if this was law before the pharmacist went in, but this is changing the contract after it's been agreed to. There won't be any grandfathering. It's insulting and demeaning. It tells Christians who object on conscience grounds to check their morals at the state line or the US border.
Who cares if rural pharmacies shut down? Abortion advocates want what they want when they want it no matter how many rural people get hurt. These pills are easily available and can be found almost anywhere. There's no need to fine these people or ram their morals down the pharmacist's throat. If Planned Parenthood is so concerned about this, they can invest in their own clinics to distribute them.
If I'm not mistaken, the bill requires pharamcies to stock these things and has mandates to re-order so they don't run out. I don't know if there are any other drugs with that kind of legal mandate, but it's hard to think of this as being so important that you need to make sure this drug never runs out. What a joke. This is idolatry.
Riddle me this....
ReplyDeleteLet's say the state had a law that all pharmacists must carry and dispense Ritalin if a patient were prescribed that.
Then, a pharmacist who is also Scientologist, refuses to either carry or dispense Ritalin because it is against his religion, feeling that ADHD kids should have thetan therapy, not psychoactive drugs.
What would be your response?
Royale, I don't know much about Ritalin except I think I once heard that teachers have wanted the powers to prescribe it. So much for pharamcy school.
ReplyDeleteI don't know anything about Scientology except that Tom Cruise is a scientologist and that the way L Ron Hubbard's book keeps selling is that his followers keep buying the book over and over again.
I suspect that Ritalin does not work as an abortifacient, like the morning after pill does. I suspect teachers need it more than the kids to keep their classroom more tame. Perhaps if teachers can't do without a classroom of Ritalin free boys who are bored stiff by their teaching they should hang up their licenses:)
Seriously, the bill would change the terms on pharmacists. It would make them mere order takers and it presents no choice. "Either violate your conscience and yourself by making this drug we worship available or we will take your license. Participate in killing or we will bankrupt you, ruin your business, take away your pharmacy and your ability to make a living." That's just one reason I don't take Planned Parenthood, NARAL and all the other abortion alphbets seriously. They pretend to be about choice and would force their morality on the rest of us. You can't even argue on their own terms... choice... because they don't mean it. It's just a ruse to give them political and cultural cover until they get what they want. In this instance, they are willing to destroy hardworking, conscientious highly trained professionals over something that is widely avaiable and is known to cause early abortions.
And a $500,000 fine, loss of license? Over what? A contraceptive-a drug to support someone's lifestyle of choice? If this is so important, Planned Parenthood can open up their own clinics in rural Nevada instead of jamming their moral choice down the throats of pharmacists. I hope the day never comes when we post signs at the Nevada or US borders that say, "check your morals at the state line. No morals allowed. All you Catholics and pro-life evangelicals and etc, either put your morals away or get/stay out. We don't want your kind here."
That's what it sounds like to me Royale. We probably aren't going to agree, but I think the liberatian in you should be on my side on this one.
It is not as if there aren't enough pharmacists that dispense birth control. If a woman wants it, there are mail order services that can handle the job just fine. After all, we do live in a flat earth society. Royale, what are your thoughts on Dr. Kevorkian? Do you think it is OK when we finally get to the point of legal suicide, would you feel comfortable with your family member receiving a perscription for that?
ReplyDelete"We probably aren't going to agree, but I think the liberatian in you should be on my side on this one."
ReplyDeleteI was trying to avoid stating what I thought, but if you want my take....
I see your point and am quite sympathetic. As a libertarian, I shudder at the idea of forcing people to do anything.
Forcing a doctor to do an actual abortion. Absolutely not.
But prescriptions, I think that's different for several reasons:
1. the chain is more annenuated
The doctor/pharmacist is doing nothing but putting pills in a container. It's the patient who ultimately decides to take the pills or not.
2. medicine is highly, highly regulated with a deference to the patient's needs, confidentiality, and respect
3. the doctor/pharmacist voluntarily joins this profession, knowing that is highly regulated
4. the doctor/pharmacist is well paid
Can you imagine a fireman, policeman, or soldier suddenly changing his mind mid-duty? To me, that's the same.
Now, the politically feesible compromise is to say, "OK, I won't prescribe it, but go to XXX." I admit that is politically practical, but I still find it squeemish that a doctor/pharmacist would violate patient trust, for any reason.
Royale
ReplyDeleteI thought your libertarian impulses would make you uncomfortable on this. I'm not good at predictions, but I seem to have gotten that one right.
I see a difference between the police and firefighters and pharmacists. The police and firefighters are employed/deputized to save lives in their actions. They would be derilict in their duties if they failed to do that.
The pharamacist is being asked to participate in death when he or she is forced to dispense morning after pills which do cause early abortions. They don't do it all the time, but they do. For them that's like a doctor being asked to perform an abortion. Most doctors don't. Many won't refer. Doctors have conscience rights. So do nurses. So should pharmacists.
As to pharmacists being order fillers, I'm guessing they don't see themselves that way after 6 years of school, an equivalent to what doctors do.
In Nevada we had a fight over this. No one really knows if there's a right or not until it goes to court. We think there is in the professional standards language. The ACLU, Planned Parenthood and etc don't.
I spoke to someone on the other side and that person is worried that the health exception was broader than just concerns for the physcial well being of the woman and they want it tightened up to eliminate concerns about her general well being-from a pro-life pharamcist's professional opinon/ perspective. I guess the broad standard in Doe for doing legal abortions based on factors other than the woman's physcial well being doesn't work here for them:)
The pharmacists have been concerned that that they might have to dispense drugs for physician assisted suicide. I suggested to a member of the pharmacy board that they make an exception for abortifacients and or situations when they think the patient might commit suicide. I'm not an attorney, but I thought that might help. They didn't want to do it.
OK, well what if a woman is raped, goes to the nearest hospital (which happens to be a Catholic affiliate), and asks for the morning after pill, but the doctor refuses because he is Catholic?
ReplyDeleteThe woman may or may not be pregnant. An embryo may or may not be fertilized.
That scenario frightens me the most. For the others, I can kind of see your point.
Thanks for your comments Royale. I'll have to look this up, but if I'm not mistaken I think some Catholic hospitals have addressed the scenario you have described so that in that situation a referal could be made. It may be more than that. I could be wrong, but I've heard talk about that. Here's a link to some testimony in Wisconsin http://www.wisconsin.nasccd.org/bins/wisconsin/content/pages/Advocacy/Testimony/sb129tst-EC%20treatment.pdf?_resolutionfile=ftppath.
ReplyDeleteRoyale, Addendum to the last comment. This came up in Wisconsin and Connecticut-so says a quick Google Search. It is not taken well by a lot of people. I just put the link in there to let you know that scenario has been discussed.
ReplyDelete