Pope Benedict XVI: Pharmacists Should Make Moral Decisions for Customers

How many people still believe that pharmacists trying to be excused from doing their job are only doing so for the sake of their own consciences? Quite a few, I suspect, and I won't deny that this is surely part of their reasoning — but I will deny that it's the only reason. I believe that they are also seeking the ability to stand in the way of women trying to do things they personally disapprove of and/or are seeking to make moral decisions for those women.

Recently, Pope Benedict XVI helped bolster this conclusion by making exactly that sort of justification for pharmacists "conscience clauses." He didn't argue that pharmacists should be excused from prescribing normal pharmaceuticals simply in order to avoid helping someone else engage in legal conduct which they themselves are personally forbidden from doing. No, he also argued that pharmacists should seek to be excused precisely so that they can "raise" others' "awareness" and to educate women about using drugs in a "morally and ethically correct way."

"Pharmacists must seek to raise people's awareness so that all human beings are protected from conception to natural death, and so that medicines truly play a therapeutic role," Benedict said. ...

In his to the 25th International Congress of Catholic Pharmacists, the pope also said that they have an educational role toward patients so that drugs are used in a morally and ethically correct way. "We cannot anesthetize consciences as regards, for example, the effect of certain molecules that have the goal of preventing the implantation of the embryo or shortening a person's life," he said.

Source: ABC News

That's right, Pope Benedict XVI would like to see pharmacists adopt new job duties that include being moral and religious teachers to the dirty women who come to them to fill prescriptions which a physician has already determined is appropriate for her. If she had wanted moral or religious guidance she presumably would have gone to a priest, but perhaps too few are doing so — or too few are heeding whatever advice they are hearing — so now pharmacists have to take on that role?

Benedict said conscientious objector status would "enable them not to collaborate directly or indirectly in supplying products that have clearly immoral purposes such as, for example, abortion or euthanasia."

Here we have an explicit reference to the idea that pharmacists opting out of doing their job in a profession they voluntarily joined should be treated like pacifists drafted into a war they never approved of to begin with. The parallels are far more superficial and minor than people like Benedict are willing to admit, however. We can use the analogy to argue that there is some reason to consider pharmacists' request, but not much more than that.

First, allowing pharmacists to opt out of doing their job cannot happen in a manner that prevents the primary task from being accomplished: ensuring that women have the same access to emergency contraception as they do to any other legally prescribed medication. You won't see governments allowing people to opt out of a draft to the point where there aren't enough people to fight.

Second, pharmacists cannot simply claim a religious objection and then walk away — real conscientious objectors have to submit an application and go through a rigorous approval process. There are punishments for lying and even those who get approval must perform alternative service. What sorts of alternatives are pharmacists willing to offer?

Finally, even conscientious objectors in wartime don't refrain from any and all forms of direct or indirect collaboration with war. They continue to pay taxes that fund the war and their alternative service frees up people who can participate more directly. Are pharmacists willing to continue indirect support for a system that provides emergency contraception to women?

In contrast to the pope's demands, Chile's government may be fine or even close pharmacies that continue refusing to stock and supply emergency contraception:

Major pharmacy chains have not been selling the pill recently, arguing they could not buy stocks locally. The government responded by importing supplies and said the stores now had no excuse for not selling the pill. ...

Deputy Health Minister Lidia Amarales warned that the government would be prepared to close a pharmacy that refused to sell the morning-after pill.

One of the chains, Salcobrand, said the government's actions were a violation of its freedom of opinion about the pill which it said was abortive. "We express conscientious objection to being forced to sell a product that can have that effect," a Salcobrand company statement quoted by the Associated Press said.

Source: BBC

I don't see how Salcobrand's freedom of opinion is being infringed upon. They can continue to hold and express the opinion that emergency contraception is abortive, just as they are free to continue to hold and express the opinion that the moon is made of green cheese — the fact that one is forced to deal with reality doesn't mean one can't hold an irrational and false opinion about reality as well. If you are going to own a company and serve the public, however, you can't expect that those irrational and false opinions will be permitted as a basis for not doing the job you claim to be in business for.

A pharmacist can cling to all sorts of false beliefs about various medications, but their job is to dispense legally prescribed medications anyway. Salcobrand's opinion that emergency contraception is no more a valid justification for refusing to dispense it than the false opinion that Viagra turns men into women, or the false opinion that birth control pills for underage girls makes them sterile, would be valid justifications for refusing to dispense them. Pharmacies must make decisions about dispensing medication on the basis of valid, accurate medical opinions — not religious opinions, not moral opinions, and not false medical opinions.