# Pharmacists and refusals **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 8, 2011, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713 "2011-04-08T20:18:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![redtail23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3e96dc/32.png) [@redtail23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/redtail23)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/281 "2011-04-12T15:43:31Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > “Conservatives think liberals have bad ideas; liberals think conservatives are bad people.” Yes, because it’s liberal pharmacists that have pushed to get conscience laws passed so that they can refuse prescriptions and let women bleed to death. Oh, I realize that the woman can just go to the pharmacy next door, which obviously exists and is obviously staffed by good conservative pharmacists who will put patient care as their first priority, so there’s never really any danger for any women anywhere. So, Bricker, you decided last year to champion these laws. Do you have any problems with the idea now that it has been demonstrated in Idaho that these laws will be extended far beyond abortifacients and contraceptives? Or are you also just fine with pharmacists making moral judgements about who can and can’t have medication, based on their personal whims? ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/282 "2011-04-12T15:44:13Z")
> [@redtail23](#): > > Sure, why not. Kind of like a “conscientious objector” status. If you want to file as a conscientious objector, you have to do it ahead of time and show justification, you don’t just get to say “oh yeah, no, I’m CO, not gonna go” when they draft you. > > If you want to be a licensed pharmacist and refuse to fill prescriptions for certain people, then you have to state up front EXACTLY what prescriptions you will refuse to fill and/or persons for whom you will refuse prescriptions, and why. The state can keep a database and publish it. If the prescription/person isn’t on the list, then you are legally obligated to fill it. You are free to update your listings as needed, as new drugs come onto the market or you change your mind about what your “morals” require. > > And you must post that information publicly and prominently in your pharmacy, along with information of an available pharmacy that will fill those prescriptions. > > That way, everyone will know not to waste their time at your shop when they need those items. Also, people have the option of choosing not to patronize your store due to your CO status. That whole “free market” thing only works when information is available to customers, y’know. Perhaps it you read the law as quoted in post 260, much of your fears and concerns over a typical Conscious Clause law would disappear. It’s not as black and white as you might believe. Your fear of women bleeding to death is unfounded. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/283 "2011-04-12T15:46:52Z")
> [@villa](#): > > I don’t see the connect here - unless you are assuming that what makes someone a bad person is only enacting objectively unjust laws. An unwise social policy can be the sign of a bad person, if the motivation behind it is a morally reprehensible one. > > And on this issue (amongst others, but this is the one before us) many conservatives simply do think many liberals are bad people. The abortion debate is a very very bad one to try to use this (generally erroneous) quote for - unless of course you think it is commonplace to refer to people with bad ideas as child murderers. For me, child murderers are pretty much up there in the pantheon of bad people. Yeah, you’re right. Consider that withdrawn. I guess if I’m going to use that canard I need to narrow it down somehow. I’m ardently pro-life, but I don’t regard the vast majority of pro-choice people as murderers in any meaningful sense. They, in good and honest faith, don’t regard a fetus as a human being. I think they’re incorrect, but that’s not an objectively provable point, and I absolutely understand that they’re arguing from what they believe. But equally obviously, plenty of other pro-life folks don’t see it that way. So… yeah. Forget I said that. It was stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/284 "2011-04-12T15:48:49Z")
> [@redtail23](#): > > Do you have any problems with the idea now that it has been demonstrated in Idaho that these laws will be extended far beyond abortifacients and contraceptives? Or are you also just fine with pharmacists making moral judgements about who can and can’t have medication, based on their personal whims? So far, I am unaware of any actual problem with the existence of these laws. I am aware of plenty of speculation, but no actual instance of a problem I regard as serious. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/285 "2011-04-12T16:37:05Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > You appear to base your arguments on fear, and an underlying belief that state legislatures are motivated to pass Conscious Clause laws due to a hated for women. They passed those laws to shield a movement that is motivated by the hatred of women. I no more believe any protestations of innocence on their part than I would believe such protestations on the part of someone supporting segregation. > [@Bricker](#): > > So far, I am unaware of any actual problem with the existence of these laws. I am aware of plenty of speculation, but no actual instance of a problem I regard as serious. Of course not; you clearly care nothing for the rights or welfare of women, so for you anything bad that happens to them isn’t a problem. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/286 "2011-04-12T16:48:25Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > It’s pretty clear that you understand that if any pharmacist can invoke the conscience clause, then _every_ pharmacist can. And once you’ve accepted that, you have no control over whether or not they will. Your disagreement is also somewhat spurious since, obviously, not everybody lives in a major metropolitan center. Or has the time to drive a few extra hours to the next pharmacy. Or what have you. I think this is an _excellent_ argument, and bears repeating. [QUOTE=Bricker] So… yeah. Forget I said that. It was stupid. [/QUOTE] Kudos for this. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/287 "2011-04-12T16:57:55Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > . . . > > It’s pretty clear that you understand that if any pharmacist can invoke the conscience clause, then _every_ pharmacist can. And once you’ve accepted that, you have no control over whether or not they will. Your disagreement is also somewhat spurious since, obviously, not everybody lives in a major metropolitan center. Or has the time to drive a few extra hours to the next pharmacy. Or what have you. > > . . . If you’d read the Conscious Clause laws, your fear of such absurd results would subside. The one I linked clearly provides for such exigent circumstances by requiring the professional to administer pending the arrival of non-objecting assistance. ---
**Author:** ![redtail23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3e96dc/32.png) [@redtail23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/redtail23)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/288 "2011-04-12T17:00:22Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > So far, I am unaware of any actual problem with the existence of these laws. I am aware of plenty of speculation, but no actual instance of a problem I regard as serious. So you don’t consider the Idaho case to be serious? Despite the fact that it wasn’t a moral objection to the “procedure”, it was a moral objection to the person? Despite the fact that this situation could have created a serious health risk to the woman if it had been in a more rural location? Or are you just assuming that something like this would never happen in a rural location? Or are you simply holding “free market” and “personal freedom” principals above all and denying that any health risk is “serious” if it contravenes those freedoms? In which case, you would have to agree that it is also OK for pharmacists to refuse prescriptions for AIDS patients or blacks or whatever, right? Anyone and anything that they decide is “immoral” at the time. Serious questions, I’m trying to understand your thinking. I can understand the argument for ‘conscientious objector’ status on abortion drugs and possibly even contraceptives. And I can also understand the “it’s my pharmacy, I’ll sell what I want to” idea. Just like I understand the “giving you a state license to a restricted arena means you don’t get to pick and choose”. I just haven’t made up my mind yet what _my_ position is on the issue. But, just as the arguments in the previous thread pushed you over the line to supporting these laws, the hypocrisy of saying “oh no, it’s fine in this circumstance that I agree with, and it’s not a problem because it would never happen in any other circumstance or any situation that would truly cause problems NA NA NA NA I CAN’T HEAR YOU” pushes me right back the other way. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/289 "2011-04-12T17:00:39Z")
I think you mean conscience clause. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/290 "2011-04-12T17:01:10Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > such absurd results No, that’s not absurd. Once any one can every one can, if they want. [And here are a bunch](http://www.ncsl.org/default.aspx?tabid=14380). Please quote the parts which you feel make my objection an absurdity. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/291 "2011-04-12T17:09:06Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > So far, I am unaware of any actual problem with the existence of these laws. I am aware of plenty of speculation, but no actual instance of a problem I regard as serious. > [@Morgenstern](#): > > If you’d read the Conscious Clause laws, your fear of such absurd results would subside. The one I linked clearly provides for such exigent circumstances by requiring the professional to administer pending the arrival of non-objecting assistance. They are working on making it worse: > [@](#): > > The bill, known currently as H.R. 358 or the “Protect Life Act,” would amend the 2010 health care reform law that would modify the way Obamacare deals with abortion coverage. > > \ > > Pitts’ new bill would free hospitals from any abortion requirement under EMTALA, meaning that medical providers who aren’t willing to terminate pregnancies wouldn’t have to – nor would they have to facilitate a transfer. > > The hospital could literally do nothing at all, pro-choice critics of Pitts’ bill say. > > SOURCE: [http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/02/new-gop-law-would-allow-hospitals-to-let-women-die-instead-of-having-an-abortion.php](http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/02/new-gop-law-would-allow-hospitals-to-let-women-die-instead-of-having-an-abortion.php) If that passes a hospital could literally watch a woman die rather than do anything, including finding her other help from another source. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/292 "2011-04-12T17:09:09Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > No, that’s not absurd. Once any one can every one can, if they want. > [And here are a bunch](http://www.ncsl.org/default.aspx?tabid=14380). Please quote the parts which you feel make my objection an absurdity. Not so. Like I suggested, looking at the particular law (linked in post 260) behind the Idaho case, you’ll see… - (4) No health care professional or employer of the health care professional shall be civilly, criminally or administratively liable for the health care professional declining to provide health care services that violate his or her conscience, except for life-threatening situations as provided for in subsection (6) of this section. . . . (6) If a health care professional invokes a conscience right in a life-threatening situation where no other health care professional capable of treating the emergency is available, such health care professional shall provide treatment and care until an alternate health care professional capable of treating the emergency is found.\* Your _no one wants to, therefore no one is available_ argument fails. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/293 "2011-04-12T17:14:48Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > Not so. Like I suggested, looking at the particular law (linked in post 260) behind the Idaho case, you’ll see… > > - > > (4) No health care professional or employer of the health care professional shall be civilly, criminally or administratively liable for the health care professional declining to provide health care services that violate his or her conscience, except for life-threatening situations as provided for in subsection (6) of this section. > . . . > (6) If a health care professional invokes a conscience right in a life-threatening situation where no other health care professional capable of treating the emergency is available, such health care professional shall provide treatment and care until an alternate health care professional capable of treating the emergency is found.\* > > Your _no one wants to, therefore no one is available_ argument fails. Is a pharmacist capable of making a medical diagnosis to determine if the uterine bleeding that may result by denying the medicine will be life threatening to the woman? What if it is merely seriously impacts her health but doesn’t actually kill her? Is that ok? What if (as a girlfriend I once had) was on birth control to manage her Endometriosis which was very painful. Since it is not life threatening it is ok to send her home to (literally…I saw it) writhe in pain? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/294 "2011-04-12T17:17:22Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > Your _no one wants to, therefore no one is available_ argument fails. Except that at least a dozen states have enacted conscience legislation and you’re only addressing one of them. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/295 "2011-04-12T17:19:01Z")
Look at all the “safety measures” in Idaho’s version: > [@](#): > > Idaho Code § 18-611 provides that no health care professional shall be required to provide any health care service that violates his or her conscience. When you consider the fact that in large parts of Idaho pharmacies are few and far between, it is quite possible to effectively ban contraceptives in this manner. Also, if this has everthing to do with personal morality and nothing to do with discrimination against women, why can’t I find any reports of pharmacists refusing to dispense Viagra or Cialis? ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/296 "2011-04-12T17:21:39Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > Not so. Yes so. You have yet to quote anything about how since anybody can deny medication, everybody can. The only objection you _have_ provided does not say what you’re claiming it does. > [@](#): > > (6) If a health care professional invokes a conscience right in a life-threatening situation where no other health care professional capable of treating the emergency is available, such health care professional shall provide treatment and care until an alternate health care professional capable of treating the emergency is found.\* The whole point of this is that pharmacists are not doctors. In point of fact determining the severity of a condition and diagnosing treatment would most likely land them afoul of practicing medicine without a license laws. Judging what is and is not a life-threatening condition is beyond a pharmacist’s job description. They also don’t define “life threatening”, what they mean by no other health care professional being capable of treating the emergency, or what “treatment and care” they must provide. Is an ambulance service that can be called to collect someone sufficient? What if there’s another pharmacy that’s a two hour’s drive away, but the person in the pharmacy is unlikely to die before, oh, 24 hours pass. Can they be sent on their way? What sort of “treatment and care” must a pharmacist provide? It doesn’t say “provide the prescription that was ordered by the patient’s physician”, so that’s not even definite. Can they give you aspirin while refusing to fill your prescription that stops uterine bleeding? And the statute you linked is hardly the only one. Can you cite and quote what provisions the other states with CC’s have that will protect doctors’ patients from pharmacists who simply don’t want to give them their legally prescribed medicines? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/297 "2011-04-12T17:23:14Z")
> [@redtail23](#): > > So you don’t consider the Idaho case to be serious? No. > [@redtail23](#): > > Despite the fact that it wasn’t a moral objection to the “procedure”, it was a moral objection to the person? Correct. > [@redtail23](#): > > Despite the fact that this situation could have created a serious health risk to the woman if it had been in a more rural location? “Could have” been serious is not the same as “was serious,” is it? Yes, it could have been even more serious if the pharmacist had asserted that the law gave him the power to kill like an avenging angel, and he had lit a sword on fire and chased the frightened patient around the store. But since that didn’t happen, I don’t regard it as serious. > [@redtail23](#): > > Or are you just assuming that something like this would never happen in a rural location? “Rural?” Very possible. But “rural” does not equal “place where no other source is reasonably available.” > [@redtail23](#): > > Or are you simply holding “free market” and “personal freedom” principals above all and denying that any health risk is “serious” if it contravenes those freedoms? In which case, you would have to agree that it is also OK for pharmacists to refuse prescriptions for AIDS patients or blacks or whatever, right? Anyone and anything that they decide is “immoral” at the time. I certainly appreciate your kind attempt to tell me what I would “have to” agree to, but inasmuch as I have not hired you as my spokesperson, I must ask that you stop trying to donate your services to the cause _gratis_. Really. It makes me feel beholden. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/298 "2011-04-12T17:23:58Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Your statement doesn’t offer any particular reason the patient’s interest should outweigh a given pharmacist’s; you simply assert it as true It should be obvious (and has long been codified into ethical standards and laws governing health care in modern society) that a patient’s rights and interests are paramount in the provision of health care. This viewpoint is expressed in all manner of responsibilities laid out for health care providers, including openness and portability of medical records, rules of physician conduct, the patient right to file complaints about poor or inappropriate treatment and so on. There is nothing revolutionary about this; it represents incremental gains made on behalf of patients over a long period. It should not come as a shock that the concept that patients’ interests are superior to those of pharmacists is viewed as self-evident. > [@Bricker](#): > > This thread is full of helpful suggestions, but as I did above with another poster’s, I will decline **Finn** ’s invitation to further refine the rules of GD to (his) peculiar liking. No one is setting out “rules” or demanding that you post to the “peculiar” standards expected in Great Debates. However, you derided another poster for having a strong opinion (which he had backed up with reasoned arguments), as is typical of GD, while having to that point posted virtually nothing yourself except a “ha-ha, a court agreed with me, so whaddaya think _now_, fools” and a couple of drive-by sneers at other posters, so you can expect to be called on it. Continue to weasel (or “wriggle desperately”, to use your own term), and your posts will be accorded the lack of respect they deserve. To repeat **redtail23** ’s question to you for a third time: > [@](#): > > Do you have any problems with the idea now that it has been demonstrated in Idaho that these laws will be extended far beyond abortifacients and contraceptives? Or are you also just fine with pharmacists making moral judgements about who can and can’t have medication, based on their personal whims? Add to that my earlier question about a pharmacist who would apparently be protected under “conscience” laws if he decided to withhold prescribed anti-retroviral medication from a patient who he thought might have contracted HIV through “immoral” means. Are you and other “Conscience Pharmacist” boosters fine with that? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/299 "2011-04-12T17:26:26Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Look at all the “safety measures” in Idaho’s version: When you consider the fact that in large parts of Idaho pharmacies are few and far between, it is quite possible to effectively ban contraceptives in this manner. Yes. It is also possible for a pharmacist to decide that this law appoints him as God’s avenging archangel. But it doesn’t seem to have actually happened. > [@Czarcasm](#): > > Also, if this has everthing to do with personal morality and nothing to do with discrimination against women, why can’t I find any reports of pharmacists refusing to dispense Viagra or Cialis? Perhaps because there are no non-fringe belief systems that might regard Viagra or Cialis as immoral. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2011, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713/300 "2011-04-12T17:35:24Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Yes. It is also possible for a pharmacist to decide that this law appoints him as God’s avenging archangel. People have pointed out what the laws involved actually say, and what behavior they actually allow. Your object “well… it hasn’t happened yet” is not persuasive or particularly relevant, but your “oh yeah, well someone could use this law to gun down a bus full of nuns!” is spectacularly transparent. Come on Bricker, it’s not really your claim that someone could just as easily use this law to say that they won’t dispense legally prescribed medicine as it is that they would act as an “avenging archangel”. So why the schtick. > [@](#): > > Perhaps because there are no non-fringe belief systems that might regard Viagra or Cialis as immoral. _And yet fringe belief systems would still be protected._ “Hey, this new law says that you can kill anybody you want, but first you have to notify them in writing 30 days in advance, and chisel, yourself, a marble statute that is an identifiable likeness on a 1:1 scale, and sing a song.” “That’s a horrible law!” “I don’t see what you mean, our feelings about the laws aren’t relevant and it’s the will of the people anyways. Besides, it hasn’t happened yet and really, how many people are that good at carving marble?” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713.md?page=14) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-and-refusals/577713.md?page=16)