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Pharmacist won't fill hormone prescription for transwoman

Minoosh

Penultimate Amazing
Minoosh
Joined
Jul 15, 2011
Messages
12,761
CVS fires Fountain Hills pharmacist who denied hormone prescription to transgender woman

This is in addition to a Walgreens pharmacist who within a month ago refused to dispense an abortifacient to a woman who had a prescription to help her deliver a dead fetus.

How pervasive is this? Neither prescription had anything to do with abortion per se. Hell, my father was going to have estrogen to help fight his hormone-fueled fueled prostate cancer. He opted for an orchiectomy instead.

Get out and vote, people. Dems, push for a constitutional amendment. Both of these pharmacists were WAY out of line. Saying no just because they could. "Conscience," my ass. Where do you draw the line? This is not religion, it is hate by petty people who are looking for any excuse to discriminate.

If there is already a thread I apologize and will ask to merge them.
 
My wife had an MD who retired. The new one who took his place would not prescribe her birth control pills based on his religion. ( her tubes were tied. The bc was just to regulate her period).

My buddy's catholic sister nurse refused to give birth control pills to patients who were staying on her ward and happened to be on the pill.

It's ********. You are an employee of the medical system. If you don't like the fact that the medical system offers birth control, find another job. Your religious "freedom" does not extend to influencing the treatment of OTHER people.
 
I quite agree, it's a disgrace. You have the right to believe what you want but not to impose those beliefs on other people.
 
That's appalling. While cross-sex hormones can be harmful the patient was an adult and had a doctor's prescription. It's not up to a pharmacist to second-guess that decision. And it doesn't even sound as if that was the reason either.

If you're in that job, you dispense the prescriptions you're given to dispense, provided they're legal and you're satisfied no mistake has been made.

(OK, if a pharmacist or two had been a bit more suspicious Harold Shipman could have been stopped a lot sooner, so I'm not saying blind obedience is the order of the day, but a pharmacist has no business imposing his or her prejudices on patients.)
 
Stupid religious prejudices aside, I think there is sometimes a conflict between Doctors and Pharmacists where sometimes the pharmacist may advise on a drug interaction that the Doc may have missed. But that is not what is going on here.
 
Minoosh said:
CVS fires Fountain Hills pharmacist who denied hormone prescription to transgender woman

This is in addition to a Walgreens pharmacist who within a month ago refused to dispense an abortifacient to a woman who had a prescription to help her deliver a dead fetus.

How pervasive is this? Neither prescription had anything to do with abortion per se. Hell, my father was going to have estrogen to help fight his hormone-fueled fueled prostate cancer. He opted for an orchiectomy instead.

Get out and vote, people. Dems, push for a constitutional amendment. Both of these pharmacists were WAY out of line. Saying no just because they could. "Conscience," my ass. Where do you draw the line? This is not religion, it is hate by petty people who are looking for any excuse to discriminate.

If there is already a thread I apologize and will ask to merge them.
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I agree 100% but working in pharmacy for a while I can shed some light on the topic. Keep in mind I don't agree with these laws this is horrible and they do, in my opinion need to change. To give you the reasoning I have heard.

Most of the time this takes place it is due to religious reasons,Hindu, muslims as well as good old fashioned white folks wanted to make a stink about not having to fill medication they don't agree with. Hell in my technician course a dozen students were able to opt out of any sex related medication learning while not being penalized.

In canada technically you are supposed to provide a pharmacy that will fill the meds but that can be circumvented fairly easily. Simply say you didn't know of any and tell the customer to call around. Now if you are in a small enough town you might be the only game around.

I mentioned this in school and was tools it would be both bigoted and insensitive to block a well paying career to folks just because of their beliefs.

Again I must reiterate, **** this. You don't want to do the job go haul bricks, plenty of folks do it.
 
Good on CVS, they know which side their bread is buttered on. There's a force in AZ much much much more powerful than party affiliation, and that's the color of money.

You could think of all the allegedly gay friendly places Rob Halford could have picked to come out in full, and he picked the allegedly homophobic, allegedly red state for it. Arizona is a weird place, but you can bet that anything that is not a deeply held core value is up for the highest bidder.

Its really weird to see these polls where they ask people which values are dear to them, and then to see how they vote with their wallets.

What color is his skin? - What color is his money?
Abortion is bad. - Are YOU gonna pay for that kid?
But they're homos! - They sure tip well and they don't make problems
Their not residents, not even citizens, why should they get in state tuition? - Would you rather they stayed on welfare or became educated enough to employ people?

Its like the old libertarian joke about the market correcting itself, but in a weird social way
 
The Sparrow said:
Stupid religious prejudices aside, I think there is sometimes a conflict between Doctors and Pharmacists where sometimes the pharmacist may advise on a drug interaction that the Doc may have missed. But that is not what is going on here.
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In that case, correct procedure is for the pharmacist to contact the doctor and discuss the medication choices. Not to refuse point-blank to fill the prescription.

There are a lot of good reasons why well-qualified pharmacists are required to fill prescriptions and its not a job you leave to the Saturday temp girl, or indeed to any ordinary shop assistant. But the other half of that coin is that anyone deciding to choose pharmacy as a career should be required to understand right at the start that they absolutely will not be permitted to refuse to fill a legal prescription on purely ideological grounds.


ETA: I think this is the real killer with this one, and the reason why the pharmacist was sacked.

Hall, in her post, said the pharmacist wouldn't return the prescription note. So, she was unable to take it to another pharmacy.
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There's something else in the article that implies the pharmacist wouldn't even return the prescription to the patient even when the doctor who wrote the prescription told him to do that. That is beyond unforgivable. If the patient had been passed on to a pharmacist who was prepared to fill the prescription it might have been acceptable, although as the article also says the pharmacist questioned the patient loudly and created an embarrassing public scene, maybe not.

What's wrong with people?
 
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Except that the US Right has been quietly pushing the pharmacist exemption thing for several years now as part of their multi-pronged plan. It wouldn't half surprise me if the upswelling of anti-trans groups is their doing too. It's much easier to crush a group if you first divide it with infighting.
 
I realise this is personal for you and I sympathise, but it would be best not to go there. I know a number of women, mostly left-wing, who are being reviled as "alt-right" for trying to have a discussion about proposed legislation they believe will impact negatively on women's rights. They're being called anti-trans and nazis for wanting to have a conversation and they're baffled and upset.
 
Mike DeAngelis, CVS spokesman, said the pharmacist violated company policy by refusing to fill the prescription.
While it's legal in Arizona[for the pharmacist to not fill the prescription], a pharmacist's refusal to fill prescriptions violates non-discrimination protections outlined in the Affordable Care Act, Kilar said.

Company policy, state law, and federal law conflicting with each other. Doesn't Federal law Trump (Ha, got him in there), state law, which trumps company policy?

I could see the pharmacist suing CVS for wrongful termination, under state law.
 
LongFuzzy said:
Mike DeAngelis, CVS spokesman, said the pharmacist violated company policy by refusing to fill the prescription.
While it's legal in Arizona[for the pharmacist to not fill the prescription], a pharmacist's refusal to fill prescriptions violates non-discrimination protections outlined in the Affordable Care Act, Kilar said.

Company policy, state law, and federal law conflicting with each other. Doesn't Federal law Trump (Ha, got him in there), state law, which trumps company policy?

I could see the pharmacist suing CVS for wrongful termination, under state law.
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Regardless of the ethics or legality of not filling the prescription, his refusal to give back the prescription would seem to be grounds for termination. It isn't his property or the store's, especially after he refused to honor it.

He may not have to fill the script himself under the law, but that doesn't give him the right to prevent anyone else from filling it.
 
LongFuzzy said:
Mike DeAngelis, CVS spokesman, said the pharmacist violated company policy by refusing to fill the prescription.
While it's legal in Arizona[for the pharmacist to not fill the prescription], a pharmacist's refusal to fill prescriptions violates non-discrimination protections outlined in the Affordable Care Act, Kilar said.

Company policy, state law, and federal law conflicting with each other. Doesn't Federal law Trump (Ha, got him in there), state law, which trumps company policy?

I could see the pharmacist suing CVS for wrongful termination, under state law.
Click to expand...
The article linked in the OP says:
But, under state law, the company must accommodate any religious convictions that prevent a pharmacist from filling specific medications. Arizona pharmacists are required to notify the company in advance about any religious convictions, DeAngelis added, so the company can make other arrangements to ensure a patient's needs are met.
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From that, it follows that if the pharmacist hadn't notified CVS of his bigoted views, that he actually was the one who violated state law. I have no idea what is actually true here - it's equally possible that CVS ********** up and failed to make proper arrangements.

Anyway, I really don't understand that this is allowed at all.
 
LongFuzzy said:
Company policy, state law, and federal law conflicting with each other. Doesn't Federal law Trump (Ha, got him in there), state law, which trumps company policy?
Click to expand...
I think we can safely assume from the dictates thus far that the Feds have no intention of enforcing their own policies in any situation involving "religious freedom" if it is the type of "religious freedom" that Trump and Co. condone.
 
quadraginta said:
Regardless of the ethics or legality of not filling the prescription, his refusal to give back the prescription would seem to be grounds for termination. It isn't his property or the store's, especially after he refused to honor it.

He may not have to fill the script himself under the law, but that doesn't give him the right to prevent anyone else from filling it.
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Agree

This sort of makes the whole right to refuse service with clashing laws thing a bit of a moot point really
 
cullennz said:
Agree

This sort of makes the whole right to refuse service with clashing laws thing a bit of a moot point really
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Apparently, Arizona Law doesn't require that he just "Step Aside". He's not required to help her in any way at all.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk
 
I agree that refusing to give back the prescription should be grounds for termination. Basically, even if one were to go along with the idea of refusing service, a prescription is property, and requires the paid service of a physician to obtain, so stealing it is theft.

e.t.a. if Arizonal law does not require a pharmacist to help in any way at all, then the pharmacist should not have the prescription in his hand at all. He's neither stepping aside nor refusing help. He's stealing.

Even if you were to go along with the idea of a pharmacist refusing service, I would expect that CVS is within its rights to fire a pharmacist who violates the rules of the pharmacy itself. When you go into a pharmacy I think you have a right to assume that the policy of the pharmacists is that of the pharmacy.

It seems obvious enough that a Muslim or a Jew who rejects pork should not take employment in a sausage factory and then refuse to work on religious grounds, and the same should be the case for a pharmacist who has scruples about filling prescriptions. It's not really about religious freedom at all. It's about religious bullying.
 
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