Doctors & Pharmacists Refusing to Prescribe the Pill
Tuesday, March 29th, 2005 12:26 pmThanks to
windrose for the link.
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Find out why growing numbers of doctors and pharmacists across the US are refusing to prescribe or dispense birth control pills
In April, Julee Lacey, 33, a Fort Worth, TX, mother of two, went to her local CVS drugstore for a last-minute Pill refill. She had been getting her prescription filled there for a year, so she was astonished when the pharmacist told her, "I personally don't believe in birth control and therefore I'm not going to fill your prescription." Lacey, an elementary school teacher, was shocked. "The pharmacist had no idea why I was even taking the Pill. I might have needed it for a medical condition."
Melissa Kelley, 35, was just as stunned when her gynecologist told her she would not renew her prescription for birth control pills last fall.
"She told me she couldn't in good faith prescribe the Pill anymore," says Kelley, who lives with her husband and son in Allentown, PA. Then the gynecologist told Kelley she wouldn't be able to get a new prescription from her family doctor, either. "She said my primary care physician was the one who helped her make the decision." Lacey's pharmacist and Kelley's doctors are among hundreds, perhaps thousands, of physicians and pharmacists who now adhere to a controversial belief that birth control pills and other forms of hormonal contraception--including the skin patch, the vaginal ring, and progesterone injections--cause tens of thousands of "silent" abortions every year. Consequently, they are refusing to prescribe or dispense them.
Read the rest of story
Access Denied
Find out why growing numbers of doctors and pharmacists across the US are refusing to prescribe or dispense birth control pills
In April, Julee Lacey, 33, a Fort Worth, TX, mother of two, went to her local CVS drugstore for a last-minute Pill refill. She had been getting her prescription filled there for a year, so she was astonished when the pharmacist told her, "I personally don't believe in birth control and therefore I'm not going to fill your prescription." Lacey, an elementary school teacher, was shocked. "The pharmacist had no idea why I was even taking the Pill. I might have needed it for a medical condition."
Melissa Kelley, 35, was just as stunned when her gynecologist told her she would not renew her prescription for birth control pills last fall.
"She told me she couldn't in good faith prescribe the Pill anymore," says Kelley, who lives with her husband and son in Allentown, PA. Then the gynecologist told Kelley she wouldn't be able to get a new prescription from her family doctor, either. "She said my primary care physician was the one who helped her make the decision." Lacey's pharmacist and Kelley's doctors are among hundreds, perhaps thousands, of physicians and pharmacists who now adhere to a controversial belief that birth control pills and other forms of hormonal contraception--including the skin patch, the vaginal ring, and progesterone injections--cause tens of thousands of "silent" abortions every year. Consequently, they are refusing to prescribe or dispense them.
Read the rest of story
no subject
Date: 2005-03-29 01:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-29 01:50 pm (UTC)Was not aware of this. Can you speak further?
no subject
Date: 2005-03-29 03:50 pm (UTC)But. AFAIK, the three main US Jewish groups find nothing wrong with birth control. Jewish tradition, _as I have heard it second-hand_ says that life begins at birth, not conception -- a child draws in the soul with the first breath, is one way I heard it. Abortion is not only allowed, but may be a mitzvah, a religious obligation, in some cases.
And moving to the other end of life, you may have noticed in the BDN, a rabbi commenting that the sort of life-support at current controversy in Florida is actually forbidden in Conservative and Orthodox Jewish belief. (Reform Jews seem to be wishy-washy on that, as in many theological fields.)
Judaism has no Pope -- beliefs vary widely within the community.
Now I'll stand back and let the actual practicing Jews in your readership rip me to shreds. Please note that my wife hasn't been inside a synagogue since her brother's wedding, maybe twenty years ago....