Can pharmacists opt out?
By John Young, Opinion page editor
Waco Tribune-Herald
Increasingly we are governed by ideologies that don't in any way reflect mainstream American thought.
When Congress made its clumsy bull's rush into the Terri Schiavo matter, 70 percent of Americans said it should have stayed out. Roughly that same number supports life-saving stem-cell research that is being blunted on the grounds of biblical verses. Now in several states, including Texas, lawmakers are being urged to equate birth-control pills and abortion. This is a distinction I'm confident a vast majority of American women will classify as ridiculous and/or immaterial. In Texas, the debate has formed around a bill under whose original language pharmacists could refuse to fill prescriptions for emergency contraception (EC) – the so-called morning-after pill. House Bill 16 would be appended to current law allowing health professionals to opt out of performing an abortion. Family planning organizations not only opposed the "conscience clause" on EC but feared that the language could be broadened to include standard birth-control pills, as is the case in a handful of states. Abortion foes, including an organization called Pharmacists for Life, assert that while birth-control pills and EC do prevent conception in several ways, they also can prevent a fertilized egg from implanting – therefore aborting human life. With much attention aimed at whether or not his bill would affect birth-control pills, bill author Frank Corte, R-San Antonio, offered a version that took out references to EC. Instead, it simply would add pharmacists to the health professionals who can choose not to perform abortions. But abortion isn't something pharmacists do anyway – unless one equates birth-control pills and abortions. If passed, seemingly, a pharmacist could cite HB 16 in refusing to fill out a prescription for EC or contraception. It is skirmishes like this that ought to get a lot of Americans wondering who is running the country, and to what end. In a visit to Texas and a stopover in Waco, National Abortion Rights Action League president Nancy Keenan called this the newest front in the war against choice. It's "not just about a woman's right to choose an abortion," she said. "It's about denying birth control." Keenan said her organization has reformulated its own message to put pregnancy prevention at the forefront. "We've been debating the abortion issue for years and fought it on their (abortion opponents') terms. Now we're going on the offensive" on behalf of prevention and education. It is somewhat amazing that anyone would have to bring such issues to the forefront of any debate. Stand up for contraception, something on which millions of women depend to control their reproductive futures? You mean people weren't already on their feet? On this issue and more, average Americans have been planted on the sofa as armies of zeal have dictated debate. Do Texans think a pharmacist should be able to refuse to fill a prescription for birth-control pills? According to the Texas Poll, 87 percent say no. Something tells me that's not guaranteed to carry the day in Austin. John Young's column appears Thursday, Sunday, and occasionally Tuesday. E-mail: jyoung@wacotrib.com
| 
