WA State Board of Pharmacy reversal: Will not force pharmacies to dispense emergency contraceptives
I read this tweet on Steph Herold’s IAmDrTiller account this morning:
“Fill prescriptions w/o discrimination” is code for forcing pharmacies and pharmacists, even if against their moral convictions, to dispense emergency contraceptives. ECs may kill newly conceived humans.
Sure enough, great news – and x2. 1st we see an anti-life decision being reversed; and 2nd it’s happening in a liberal state. According to Planned Parenthood of WA:
On Tuesday, August 17th, the WA State Board of Pharmacy issued an official notice that they intend to make a new pharmacy rule and end the requirement that pharmacies dispense medications without discrimination or delay.
This controversy dates back to 2006, when BOP attempted to enact a rule forcing pharmacies and pharmacists to dispense ECs even if in violation of their consciences.
A pharmacy and 2 pharmacists promptly sued in 2007 when the rule took effect, and the case has been tied up in court since.
When the case was scheduled to go to trial on July 26, BOP asked for and was granted a stay, stating it proposed to change the rules back. In granting the stay, the judge tipped his hand, according to RH:
Judge Ronald Leighton… may very well have ruled in favor of the plaintiffs (the pharmacy and pharmacists bringing the suit).
Leighton provided a small window into his views on issues related to womens’ health and rights during the motion for summary judgement when he stated that he “knew of no other case, in the country, until this one, that chips away at that protective cocoon” established by government after Roe v. Wade to protect those with a religious objection to providing abortion services, via conscience clauses.
He was also concerned that his local Catholic hospital, St. Joe’s in Tacoma, WA, would be forced to provide emergency contraception in their pharmacy, should the case be won by the state….
I should note the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2009 refused to issue an injunction against the rule, giving the other side a 1st round win – no surprise, given that court’s radical liberal bent.
But our side stuck with it and won. Congrats to WA pro-lifers. Given that the abortion drug Ella, falsely classified as an emergency contraceptive by the FDA, is now on the horizon, the stakes grow higher.
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Might I suggest that we all stop using the pharma-gimmick name “emergency contraceptives” meant to fool people? How about “powerful breast cancer and birth defect causing steroids that can give you heart disease and screw up your cycle forever.”
Calling something that works both before and after conception a contraceptive is exactly what the pharmaghouls want people to believe. We now lead the world in breast cancer incidence, btw..
Very surprising, since this is such a liberal state.
I am applying to social work school — I would like to get my MSW. My goal is to work with veterans, or another service population where the subject of abortion will not rear its ugly head. I just don’t want to deal with it.
Wish me luck!
Philly, I’m afraid you are going to have a tough time avoiding it. 43% of American women get an abortion, and that’s not even counting the ones that occur thanks to the pills mentioned in this article.
“powerful breast cancer and birth defect causing steroids that can give you heart disease and screw up your cycle forever.”
I love these hysterical claims with no scientific evidence whatsoever. I took Plan B after I got pregnant. A few weeks later, I took a test. Still pregnant. It doesn’t cause abortion.
Anti-contraception people exploit people’s poor understanding of science to claim that emergency contraception causes abortion. The truth is that there’s no way to test whether or not a pill prevents implantation. Until implantation, fertilized eggs are basically floating, and are completely unrecognized to the body. Implantation causes the hormonal and physical changes we call “pregnancy.”
People ask, “Does the pill prevent implantation?” And scientists respond “We can’t test that, so it’s possible.” So anti-contraception people want to force pregnancy on rape victims and deny people Plan B because a fertilized egg may or may not be there.
And as Amanda Marcotte pointed out,
Women on the pill will certainly slough off exponentially fewer fertilized eggs than women using nothing. Because if you’re ovulating and having unprotected sex, then you’re fertilizing eggs that die. But if you’re not ovulating, you’re not. Easy-peasy. Even if one egg slips through once every 60 months or something, gets fertilized and sloughs of, that’s still many fewer fertilized eggs than a woman not on the pill is “killing”. If you want women not to kill fertilized eggs, you’d actually want the pill to be mandatory.
Using the birth control pill and Plan B is not abortion, and trying to claim it is hides the real agenda: banning all contraception.
Science lesson time: a ‘fertilized egg’ only exists for a nanosecond. As soon as the sperm penetrates the egg, both the sperm and egg no longer exist. The vector of life has begun and rapidly this new single-celled human being starts to develop. First, the cells divide but the size hardly changes, then YOU, yes YOU developed this same way, begin to grow in size. This growth in number and size begins while YOU made your way down the fallopian tube, before implantation. Growth IS a clear sign of LIFE. Implantation doesn’t make you a little bit more pregnant. As soon as the parents’ DNA mixes, a new person is developing. This growth and development will continue until the person, I said THE PERSON, reaches adulthood. Only then does growth end and aging begin. There is NO SUCH THING AS A WOMAN BEING ONLY A LITTLE BIT PREGNANT. Go back to science class or pick up a textbook on embryology. I’ve got one two feet from my desk.
My aim is not to destroy all contraception, heck if guys want to get snipped, have at it! My aim is to see the end of abortion, which kills unborn children. But you know what, if believing that certain people are self-oppressed and just hate sex and don’t want anyone to have sex, etc., if believing that is your goal, go ahead and believe it. But it doesn’t make your lies true.
Philly – Only the west side of the state is liberal, the east side is almost all conservative. “I think it’s too close to north Idaho lol”
This reversal is SO wrong on SO many levels… I know you guys see it as a way to keep morning after drugs out of the hands of anyone, but think about this from a legal standpoint. What if pharmacies decide they don’t want to distribute AIDS medication because its “god’s punishment of gays”? Your personal beliefs cannot be allowed to interfere with doing your job if your job is to service the public.
I know you guys don’t like this drug or others like it but the fact remains they are approved by the FDA. They are legal and for a lot of women necessary. It is not up to a pharmacist “with minor medical training” to decide what medicine they FEEL good about dispensing.
This is simply a group of pharmacists WAY over-stepping their knowledge and training to make a decision, they are not qualified to make, on someone else’s healthcare.
A Gynecologist can’t hang up a sign that says “I Only Take Married Clients!” in their office. A plastic surgeon cannot hang up a sign that says “I only do surgery on white people” in their office, and most plastic surgery is elective…
A doctor can refuse elective surgery, for example if you are a diabetic, he may decide that your facelift is too risky and even though you are waving cash in his face and your blood sugar levels are under control, he can still refuse you, legally.
Nice try comparing poison to Aids medication, but last time I checked Aids medications weren’t deliberately used to kill the Aids patient. If they were, I would hope a doctor would loudly object! Abortion drugs are being used to murder children and they are not less of people because you have more cells than they do. I have more cells than a 2 year old and I’m not allowed to murder him. Women don’t need abortions. Women need to live in an environment where their offspring aren’t treated like Public Enemy Number 1. Not to mention how dangerous these drugs are to the women who take them, nor to mention how bad for the environment to dispense them left and right and flush the chemicals right into our waterways.
Ashley: the rate of ectopic pregnancy is drastically higher when hormonal birth control is used (and even more so with IUDs) (that is, ectopic pregnancies as a percentage of total pregnancies on hormonal birth control, vs. ectopic pregnancies as a percentage of total pregnanices while not using hormonal birth control). I may not be a doctor but I’m pretty sharp. If the rate of ectopic pregnancies is higher, either hormonal birth control causes ectopic pregnancy, or it is better at preventing normal pregnancy than it is at preventing ectopic pregnancy–either way it must happen post-fertilization, because you can’t get to implantation without going through fertilization.
Ashley,
You don’t have to have anti-artificial contraceptives people to say artificial contraceptives are horrible. Just read the fine print–the page covered in warnings and you’ll get the info you need.
Or you can always check out what this doctor has to say: http://onemoresoul.com/contraception/risks-consequences/breast-cancer-risk-from-abortion.html
And this article by Coalition On Abortion/Breast Cancer:
http://onemoresoul.com/news-commentary/study-abortion-contraception-raise-breast-cancer-risk.html
To just name a few risks of artificial birth control.
Oh, I know. I won’t use hormonal contraception because of the health risks. But to say it causes abortion is unproven.
Biggz, 2:37PM
Not quite. Your personal beliefs can indeed influence what you sell the public. In fact businesses can determine what they will or will not sell based on religious conviction or personal ethics. For instance the Hindu grocer can refuse to sell meat. The Jewish butcher may sell only Kosher meats and not pork products. The Amish grocer may not sell foods requiring refrigeration.
This may cause you inconvenience. That’s unfortunate, but they do have a right to determine what services they will offer.
Also, pharmacists have every right to question and refuse to fill a prescription if they have concern it will harm the customer. If your doctor writes a wrong dosage, won’t you want your pharmacist to catch it and insist you get another prescription?
I’ve seen it happen.
BTW the doctors can determine exactly what services they will offer and refuse others. Racial, ethnic, or religious discrimination is forbidden by law. If the clients do not like the stand the doctors take, they will have to take it upon themselves to find another physician.
Hi ninek,
Absolutely. In fact a doctor would be considered unethical and possibly guilty of malpractice for performing certain procedures, whatever the patient’s desires. If he/she wants to find a physician who will take the risk that is their decision, but the doctor does not have to compromise his/her ethics because a patient demands it.
I often wonder about the young women that go into the abortion clinic, distraught and crying throughout the whole ordeal. Are they flagged as someone not quite sure of herself and her decision?? Nope. Just get up on the table honey. It will be over soon and you can get on with your life.
Not to mention all of the girls crying and wailing after their abortions. Some even holding their stomachs and screaming for their babies. They are given cookies and sent on their way and told that crying is normal.
Can you imagine if a REAL Dr. goes ahead with a procedure on someone who is so obviously in distress???
Ashley,
Okay, maybe the condom doesn’t cause abortions, but as to the rest, I think there’s enough evidence out there to say it can. Just look at how artificial contraceptives work! They aren’t designed to work WITH the body, but ONLY how they are engineered. They create environments that aren’t “baby-friendly”.
Plus, I doubt even if every doctor and their mother said artificial contraceptives caused abortion there’d STILL be people who use them.
Look at the case with cigarettes. There’s all kinds of warnings on them, and they’re known to have carcinagens and all that. People STILL get addicted and STILL smoke them. Some have even died from it.
So-called proof won’t change anything..only people will.
I often wonder about the young women that go into the abortion clinic, distraught and crying throughout the whole ordeal. Are they flagged as someone not quite sure of herself and her decision??
I wasn’t allowed on a plane once because I was crying, making a scene, and fighting with someone on the phone. They were concerned I was being “forced to go somewhere I didn’t want to be,” and questioned me about it. I thought it was overboard, but they weren’t having it.
Do clinics perform abortions on women who are obviously distraught? I hope the answer is no. Instead of doing the abortion anyway, they should be figuring out why she’s upset and if necessary, refuse to do it on ethical grounds.
Ashley,
Of course they do them. There are young women I know that cried through the whole thing and didn’t want an abortion and nobody stopped and asked if MAYBE she should take some more time to THINK.
In the recovery room after mine, there were girls everywhere crying and wailing and I remember several holding their stomachs and crying out, “My baby, my baby!!”
Nobody on the staff seemed concerned in the least. I was told all of the reactions I was having were “normal” too.
Just heard of a young girl in MN who didn’t want an abortion and her parents FORCED her and PP was there to make sure the parents got what they wanted. A dead grandchild and a wounded daughter.
Oh and Ashley?
I have friends that were held down by the staff and forcibly aborted.
Can you imagine any other procedure done against someone’s will??
That is sickening. A very upset patient should be considered unable to consent and sent home. If you’re sure of what you’re doing, you’re not going to be sobbing. If PP really is doing that, someone needs to be investigating and shutting that effing operation down.
Agreed Ashley!!(what happened to “my body, my choice??”)
http://www.theunchoice.com/Coerced.htm
There are several states that have legislation in place or are considering it. The problem as I see it is PP feels they are above the law and how are all of these prolife laws meant to protect women getting enforced?
Good, I shall continue to refuse to dispense these.
Mind you, I wouldn’t care if the law forced me to do so anyway. My soul means more to me than their silly little laws.
Carla and Ashley,
In 1978, 5 years after Roe, while doing undercover work in abortion clinics situated in Chicago’s best neighborhoods, reporters made some startling discoveries. This is when reporters were in fact reporters and not gov’t lapdogs.
1. Local medical school interns and residents “moonlighted” at the abortion clinics for the quick cash
2. Time was money and money was the name of the game for the profiteers who ran the clinics, which included a former used car salesman and a mortiician school dropout.
3. In their haste, “doctors” didn’t always bother to change their gloves or wash their hands.
4. A reporter, posing as a counselor, was ordered by her supervisor to stop trying to help a distraught patient. “We don’t have time for that we’re much too busy” she quoted the supervisor as saying.
Also “counselors” were hired off the street not to counsel but with instructions that they were to make certain the client did not get away.
The reason the Pill can and does cause abortions is because of the hormones. Here’s what happens: The lining of the uterus is greatly thinned out by the hormones (instead of remaining in its normal state, which is thick and lush), and this creates what’s known as a “hostile environment.” If breakthrough ovulation occurs and the woman conceives, the embryo will have an extremely difficult time implanting in the thin, dry lining of the uterus. Sometimes it will implant and we’ve all heard of women who got pregnant on the Pill, but in most cases, the embryo will not be able to implant, and will die. This is how an abortion occurs.
To understand this even more clearly, think about a garden. Compare what will happen if you triy to plant a flower in brittle, dry soil versus what will happen if you try to plant a flower in rich, moist soil. Which flower will have the greater chance of surviving? And so it is with the Pill: If breakthrough ovulation and conception occurs, chances are, the unnatural “hostile environment” of your womb (created by the Pill) will be unable to support that life – and you will indeed miscarry. That is the abortifacient nature of the Pill and other hormonal “contraceptives.”
Thank you, Bruce!!
Fight the good fight!!
The butcher shop I was referred to weathered numerous legal complaints, but no one would shut it down until a few years ago, much too late for me. I could not even describe for you what happened to me, especially not on a forum with strangers and hostile pro-aborts reading and judging. I was not allowed to leave. I was. not. allowed. to. leave. After much soul searching, some counseling, and a large amount of healing that is still a work in progress, my only consolation is this: in the next life, I will meet my child. And she knows what really happened, and God knows what really happened. Pro-choice advocates can sing their lies all they want, but what happened to me was NOT empowering. It was the most exploitive, horrible experience any human being could possibly endure. And for what, a few hundred bucks? I am 100% certain that if I had had a few days to think it over, the panic would have passed, and later a family would have welcomed the child into their lives through adoption. I applaud the very brave parents who can get up in public, like at Silent No More. They are my heroes.
ninek,
This might go without saying but I am going to say it anyway. Thank you for coming here. Thank you for your transparency and for letting us know what happened. I am so sorry.
YES WE WILL MEET OUR CHILDREN!!
Let us grieve with hope together.
I like this ruling. It protects catholic Hospitals. It also can begin to protect churches that have convictions and refuse to do gay marriages.
ninek,
I’m sorry about what happened to you, but you make a lot of proud of you for dealing with your memories with human rights activism. Thank you.
My ex girlfriend was horribly coerced by a controlling twin sister and her friends into taking these supposedly harmless pills. About a week later, she was on the phone with me crying, puking and bleeding her guts out. She also told me how incredibly depressed they made her, and found out the truth about them online after she took them. The other girls had gotten them from student health for free and lied to her about them. She tried to take her life a few weeks later.
Here is just some of the real data and science that Ashley wants to keep women in the dark about:
http://polycarp.org/statement_mayo_clinic_article.htm
Interesting graph, huh? Here is some more..
http://uvalies.org/birthdefects.html
It is thanks to people like Ashley that we now lead the world in breast cancer incidence. They STILL want to keep women in the dark about steroids.
I know someone who was forced into having an abortion. She said that she woke up sore and thought she had fought the doctors throughout the proceedure. She said she wouldn’t wish her experience on her worst enemy.
God bless you, Bruce.
We will all meet our children–Carla and Ninek, they will tell you, “Mom, you did me proud.” (I hope Ashley’s son or daughter lost to abortion, and her son or daughter lost to miscarriage, will be able to do that as well.)
Thanks for being so kind! I’ve seen some pretty negative things on the internet and tv when women talk about their bad experiences. Although certain people cry ‘don’t blame the victim’ about the subject of rape, when it comes to abortion, I’ve seen & heard, ‘oh if it really happened that way, she would have done this or that’ and ‘oh, then you should have done this or that’.
I really like Jill Stanek’s blog because she’s very open about who can comment and what people can say. Even though we can get angry about what some people write, I can also see a lot of compassion and love on this page!