Healthcare Workers, Religion and Personal Rights
January 30th, 2006 | by Paul Merda |We have all heard by now that some Pharmacists are refusing to fill prescriptions for contraceptive medications because it doesn’t “fit into their belief system”. There are a dozen states considering legislation that would uphold this “right”. What seems to have been forgotton about is the rights of the patients to have the medications and/or procedures that fit into the patients belief system. If these states and other right-wing lunatics want to allow a pharmacist to keep their job even though they refuse to do it consistently AND they don’t put the rights of the patient first, are we going to stop the local grocery store from firing a Hindu butcher who refuses to cut beef? I have an idea, if you don’t want to do your job how about getting another one!
16 Responses to “Healthcare Workers, Religion and Personal Rights”
By Jet on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
THe fact that Walgreens offered to move these employee’s jobs to away from Illinois and their laws regarding dispensing to Missouri (they work within driving distance of it) to work with them due to their objections indicates a pretty damn sensitive employer. This is just about making a stink. They want to make the world conform to their wishes. Where do these people and their egos come from?
By jerseymcjones on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
THIS IS GOD DAMNED ‘FN RIDICULOUS!!! The professionals are licenced by the state and sworn to their duty - THEY CAN NOT PICK AND CHOOSE WHICH OF THOSE DUTIES THEY WOULD PERFER TO PERFORM!!!!
I FRIGGIN HATE AMERICA THESE DAYS!!!!
JMJ
By LiberPaul on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
Yeah, kinda like a guy who enlists in the Army and then refuses to shoot at the enemy….where would that get ya? It’s not like anyone forced these people to become pharmacists. If you don’t like what you have to do in a profession, it’s time to get a new profession!
By tos on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
Jersey- I am not condoning the pharmacist’s refusal to fill birth control prescriptions because believe me the more the better,but your statement regarding how you hate America these days,do you think these pharmacists jut started refusing to fill them or do you think no one ever brought it up until now? I find it difficult that 10 years ago and before they were willing to fill them and now that Bush is in office they refuse. So if you “hate America these days you should of hated it all the while”
By jerseymcjones on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
tos, if I could, I would expatriate tomorrow. This country is full of fucking idiots who deserve whatever they get. I am beginning to just not care anymore. People like these pharmacists are scumbags of the lowest order. If one of them refused to serve my wife’s pills, I’d push him onto the floor and take the fucking pills myself. Assholes.
JMJ
By Mike Lehman on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
Calm down, it’s not like someone came to the hospital and was refused emergency surgery because of the surgeon’s “belief system.” (I’m sorry, I am a surgeon, but my belief system dictates that I can’t cut anyone open!)
As odd as it sounds, pharmacists are medical practitioners. They don’t have to fill the perscriptions. This is a simple example of freedom. However, just as these pharmacists have the freedom to refuse to fill the perscriptions, their employer has the freedom to can them, move them or demote them. And this would not be religious persecution, because their job is to fill the perscriptions of people who come to their store.
You see, in the USA, you have the freedom of speech (and of action, by extension). What you don’t have is freedom from the consequences of that speech.
By chasingdogma on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
I was going to say what Mike said, but he beat me to it. Well put.
By Cranky Liberal on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
Amen Mike, that is it exactly. Make a choice because of your beliefs and reap the reward or pay the price. That’s freedom. However, we shoudl be passing laws that REQUIRE pharmicists to fill any perscription presented to them because they should not be allowed to veto a doctors recomentation. If nothing else it should be enshrined in law that it is not grounds for a wrongful terminationm suit - Mike i’m sur eyou know that unless it’s spelled out exactly, someone will suie and will win because of it.
By icoman on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
The Right has thrown this issue in with the rest of their fear smear. “The Muslims are making more babies so we Christians have to make more babies.” Ottmann suggested the same thing in a post yesterday. The Right has turned it into a culture war. Rule out abortions, stop contraceptives, eliminate the pill and promote procreation. Make more babies. This is really getting out of hand.
By LiberPaul on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
Yes sir Icoman. It is getting a bit crazy. I think part of it is to basically “put women back in their place”. And I don’t doubt that OTTMAN and his ilk think that we need to produce a bunch more good christian babies that women either don’t want or can ill-afford. I mean if you don’t want anymore children you could just stop having sex…. Abstinence, it’s not just for teens anymore. I hate them, I hate them so very much.
By jerseymcjones on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
But Mike, are not pharmacists required to dispense pharmacueticals? Isn’t there anything in the professional licensing that requires this?
JMJ
By Tom Harper on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
“it’s not like someone came to the hospital and was refused emergency surgery”
Granted, it’s not quite in the same category as a heart attack or bleeding from an artery, but still…if she doesn’t take that morning-after pill fairly soon she’s gonna get pregnant. And of course lots of Biblehumpers would be willing to adopt and raise this child that they insisted be born. NOT.
There’s absolutely no logic to any of this shit about the morals and convictions of pharmacists or any other health care workers. When you report for work you check your beliefs and convictions at the door. OR, get another job that doesn’t clash with your beliefs.
I’d like to see Pat Robertson hire an atheist (or a Muslim, or a devil-worshipper). No doubt he’d be willing to let this employee write his own sermons and refuse to say anything that clashes with his own beliefs. Wouldn’t he?
By LiberPaul on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
I live in the Cleveland Ohio area and there’s little doubt that if my wife was refused a prescription like that, she could just go somewhere else. But alot of people who live in rural areas don’t always have that as an option. I also guess, that its in the rural areas where this kind of thing goes on most…
By Pia Savage on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
Medical practitioners have an ethical duty to fill a prescription if it’s for the patients best interests. That ethical duty doesn’t involve putting one’s own idealogy into a prescription
There isn’t a pharmacist in America who could say “sorry, it’s not in your best interests not to get pregnant.” That’s putting their own values above the patients values. That’s not ethical. And birth control pills are often used for other reasons, very valid health reasons.
Or do men love to watch a woman have her period for half the month? I can’t imagine any man enjoys that. Many women have cysts that grow back; the only way of controlling them without more surgery is the birth control pill
Pharmacists who don’t want to fill all prescriptions that don’t contradict each other should find another line of work
This is America; everybody can find a great job if they look hard enough; I actually don’t believe that but that’s one of the arguments that has been thrown at me. Like throwing them back when they fit
By Liberal Army Wife on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
As a sufferer of endometriosis (look it up, I’ll wait) I have had to be on hormones of one type or another for most of my life. The nastiness of some pharmacists made me feel awful. I had one look at me when I was about 16 and say something about controlling myself. When my mother explained to him that I had this condition and needed the hormones to prevent more cysts (most the size of a grapefruit, imagine when THAT bursts, they thought I had a burst appendix!) he had the grace to apologize. BUT NO ONE SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO JUDGE ANYONE IN THAT WAY! sorry, didn’t mean to shout.. Besides, if a guy can buy condoms and only have to put up with a dig in the ribs, a wink and chortle, why should a woman of any age have to be made to feel shame for controlling her own fertility? Damn it, its MY body, not yours, or his, or anyone else’s. Its MINE>
By Cranky Liberal on Jan 30, 2006 | Reply
Thats right, and YOUR doctors persription and the pharmacies drugs - not the jackass behind the counter who wants to cast dispersions your way (and hey who cares if it was because you were wanton - thats between you, and you and you). They have the right to their opinion - just not to their job. We need to drive tha point home over and over.