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Pharmacist Refusal Clauses: There's No Conscience In Sending Women Elsewhere
Let's examine two discordant facts:
FACT: At any given time, 70 percent of women between the ages of 15 and 44 are sexually active and do not want to become pregnant. Of that group, 98 percent, or virtually all, have used a form of contraceptive. This widespread need and use of contraceptives indicates they are one of the most popular types of preventive care for women in this country.
FACT: A smattering of state laws, state pharmacy board rules and corporate policies exist for the sole purpose of granting pharmacists permission to deny women access to their birth control prescriptions.
As I type, the Washington State Board of Pharmacy is considering whether to repeal a 2007 rule that prevented pharmacies from refusing to dispense medication. As reported in RH Reality Check, "two of the three women on the board support keeping the rule as-is (ie, ensuring that pharmacies cannot refuse to dispense medication) and three of the four men support changing it to allow pharmacies to refer women elsewhere."
I call dangerous ideas like these "wild goose chase" policies, and having done quite a bit of activism on pharmacist refusal clauses through my local NOW chapter before becoming a national officer, I've seen how this argument sometimes gets a gloss-over and is considered a "reasonable accomodation" or "compromise," which it very much is not.
So, without even getting into the travesty of a pharmacist being allowed to subvert the doctor-patient relationship, violate the Hippocratic Oath to "do no harm," and spout lies that birth control, including emergency contraception, causes abortion (scientifically impossible, folks), here are my top five reasons why policy that might force women to travel from pharmacy to pharmacy in search of a pharmacist who'll fill her pills is dangerous, discriminatory and anything but reasonable:
1. Think beyond the city. Women in rural areas may need to travel 30 miles or more to reach other pharmacies -- it's not uncommon.
2. Think beyond ableism. Women with disabilities may not be able to access other pharmacies.
3. Think beyond the wealthy. Women struggling to make ends meet may not have the means to travel, whether they don't have access to a car, resources for additional transportation or flexibility to take time off work to travel to other pharmacies.
4. Think beyond dreams of something beyond a profit-driven private insurance industry. Women with certain medical plans may be able to fill prescriptions at only a fixed number of pharmacies.
5. Think beyond unlimited time. Women with time-sensitive birth control prescriptions may not have the time to travel to other pharmacies, whether we're talking about an emergency contraception prescription or regular monthly pills.
In 2006 the NOW National Conference passed a resolution in support of in-store access to birth control.
It's unbelievable to me that in 2010 basic medical care for women remains under attack, and we've got to fight this battle along with forcing insurers to cover our prescriptions (and making sure HHS reverses its misguided decision to omit contraceptives from its preventive care guidelines).
If you're poor, well, it must be because you didn't work hard enough. I can't possibly be bothered trying to imagine how things might have turned out badly for you. It simply must be your fault.
If you experience an unplanned pregnancy, become obese, get trapped in an abusive relationship, etc, it's something that was 100% within your control, and you should be chastised for your failure. Again, I can't possibly envision what your life is like, so I'll tell you what my life is like and explain why I would never end up in a situation like yours.
Perhaps this blaming and lack of empathy makes us feel superior and safe. Bad things will not happen to ME. I do not need any services or rights in place to protect or empower ME, because I will never be in your sad, self-inflicted shoes.
The only thing we do seem good at envisioning is being rich (and the media help us out with this a lot). We want to protect all those millionaires and billionaires out there and all their tax breaks -- I guess because we think we could be rich ourselves someday (curse you, lottery!).
If only we could picture ourselves as someone less fortunate, someone who needs a hand up to help them get back on their feet, or someone who is being denied the same rights as others because they are different. Let's face it, none of us is fully self-reliant, and the sooner we come to terms with this truth, the sooner we can get to work reinforcing the fabric of our society that holds us all together.
I think that even calling it a "wild goose chase" is a glossing over, with all due respect.
This is not a silly game of words perpetrated by religious nut cases, this is an actual war on the lives of women.
Your list means nothing to those who would rather see us dead than control our lives.
Until women in general, and hopefully NOW members and leaders, realize that we are in an actual WAR! womens' need for survival will never bee recognized by anyone.
We will always be fingered as whiny bitches who just want to be skinny and do with our lives as we choose while killing babies.
Just selfish and egotistical brats.
As if not wanting to die is selfish and egotistical!
I honestly don't think NOW has taken this attack on women seriously enough.
There has not been enough PR promoting women's lives over religious fundamentalism.
And too many young women take their hard fought for rights for granted.
College girls scoff at the idea that the day could come when men strip them of their right to birth control or the morning after pill. They laugh at the mere idiocy of the suggestion.
They have not been in the trenches long enough to know the truth, and they have not been taught the history of how a right can turn on a word or a single law.
In this aspect NOW has failed our young women.
Troops need to be rallied, flames kindled, flags unfurled and pens sharpened for the battle ahead. Women need to gird their loins with the truth and with the outrage of their shame and lack of representation by their own government, to fight the hatred and misogyny of religion, the abuse and disrespect of legally accepted violence against us, the ludicrous portrayal of women as mere sexual objects.
This is real war ladies, not some semantic word play. Real get down and dirty and fight for your friggin lives, WAR.
Time to wake up and quit making lists of our rights but instead lists of who our enemies are in the government and in the private sector and destroy them with our words and our might.
Jenny
I live in Westchester county and there is NO NOW chapter here. So I am starting one.
Nanakoosa is spot on also. Westchester county is home to middle and upper middle class women who seem more interested in shopping for handbags and shoes (I love them too, but seriously, how many pairs does a woman really need?).
Having had to drive my 18 year old to CVS to get the morning after pill and see how she was treated as though she were some kind of baby killer by the pharmacists was disgusting. THey KNOW the MAP is just birthcontrol pill enhanced. She had to prove she was 18 too. Really shameful in a supposedly free country.
As for Sarahr, really? PMS??
You aren't a little pissed at your third class status?
And you use a man's slanderous dismissal against one of your own sisters' valid outrage?
Shame on you.
FACT: Killing babies destroys their reproductive rights.
Let's clear some things up about the morning after pill. It contains high levels of progesterone, which is a naturally occurring steroid hormone. Its normal duties include inhibiting another hormone, GnRH (or Gonadotropin Releasing Hormone) which will, if released, signal for the secretion of follicle stimulating hormone and Luteinizing hormone from the anterior pituitary. Luteinizing hormone stimulates ovulation, so, in plain English, high progesterone= no ovulation, which means there is no egg. Fertilization can't take place without an egg. Sorry, no baby killing today, love.
http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/conscience-tug-of-war-in-washington/
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