Christian Right's War on Women's Choices

Not content to criminalize abortion, conservative Christians in America are also seeking to eliminate women's access to birth control pills. Their tactic is to get doctors to refuse to prescribe them and pharmacists to refuse to fill the prescriptions. They are gaining some success in this.

The BBC reports:

Pro-choice groups now call it a significant and growing trend. Lisa Boyce of Planned Parenthood in Wisconsin says it is a conscious extension of the abortion debate. "They've done so much with outlawing and restricting access to abortion that they've set their sights on birth control because there's nothing else really they can do to further restrict abortion here in Wisconsin," Ms Boyce says. "Which is counter-intuitive because if you're against abortion in the least you'd think you would see the value in enhancing access birth control, the very means women look to preventing pregnancy and the need for abortion."

This year 12 states took steps to try to introduce so-called conscience clauses. They allow pharmacists to refuse to dispense drugs, including the Pill, on moral grounds, without losing their jobs. In Wisconsin, the mostly-Republican assembly passed the bill, only to have it vetoed by the Democratic governor. Representative Curt Gielow says pharmacists should be protected. "There was an incident where a pharmacist who worked in a retail drug store refused on conscience to fill a prescription and that individual was terminated from employment," Mr Gielow says. "That, I believe, set the stage for concern there might be employment discrimination opportunity here if in fact you listened to your conscience instead of doing what the boss told you to do."

Of course, contraception isn't the only reason why the pills are prescribed — but a pharmacists who refuses to fill the prescription presumes to judge the purpose of the pill, something that lies outside what they are licensed to do. Pharmacists have duty to spot mistakes and dangerous drug interactions, but they also have a duty not to second-guess doctors who write the prescriptions when there is no clear danger to the patient. Pharmacists who refuse to fill valid prescriptions not only shouldn't be protected from being fired, they shouldn't even be allowed to keep their licenses.

Will the battle be taken to condoms next? I don't see why not. Some might find the suggestion ludicrous, but a similar reaction would have existed just a few years ago to the suggestion that anyone would have fought against access to birth control pills. Don't let the language about "abortion" fool you. This is a war against women's ability to choose what happens to their bodies and their ability to have greater control over their reproductive capacity.

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