Pharmacists & Women's Health
Science Magazine has an abstract online for what looks like might be an interesting article:
Pharmacist refusals to dispense--and in some cases to refer or transfer--prescriptions for contraception threaten women's access to basic health care both in the United States and around the world. In the United States, this problem appears to be growing; increasing reports of pharmacist refusals have surfaced in the media, and numerous states have introduced bills that would amend pharmacy codes to permit pharmacists to refuse to dispense contraception. This Policy Forum reviews current legal standards and professional ethics that govern the practice of pharmacy; this review, together with an assessment of the harm to women's health, dictates that women must have access to contraception at the pharmacy without delay, harassment, or other interference.
Refusals to dispense contraceptives because of one's moral objections to contraceptives is not like refusing to dispense medication that will have a bad interaction with some other medication or because of a health condition that the patient has. In these latter cases, the pharmacist is making a judgment that the physician would have made if they had been aware of the relevant information — the pharmacist is not substituting their medical or ethical judgment for that of the physician or the patient.
That, however, is exactly what is happening when the pharmacist refuses to dispense contraceptives. This isn't a medical decision and it isn't a judgment that we can assume the doctor would have made given more information. Instead, the pharmacist is substituting their own personal and religious standards for those of the patient, something that not even the physician has a right to do when it comes to standard medical care.
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