LACONIA, New Hampshire, September 28, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A pharmacist is in the spotlight for refusing to fill a prescription for the abortifacient morning-after pill over the week-end.
Suzanne Richards reported to a local newspaper that Brooks pharmacist Todd Sklencar refused to fill her prescription Saturday when she drove up to the drive-through prescription counter. After initially being refused by Sklencar's assistant, she told the assistant that she had received the same prescription there before. Sklencar then came to the window and said he disagreed with abortion on moral grounds, and would not provide the prescription.
He advised her to try another pharmacy. "He said something like, 'I believe this will end the fertilization of the egg and this conception was your choice,'" she described to Foster's Sunday Citizen. "I'm a single mother and I'm just trying to be responsible," Richards claimed. "When I realized what he was saying, I pulled the car over in the parking lot and just cried."
After returning to the pharmacy later that night with her father, she was refused a second time, Richards said. She said that when she was contacted by another Brooks pharmacist Tuesday to tell her the prescription was ready, it was too late for the so-called emergency contraception, which needs to be administered within 72 hours.
New Hampshire is one of many states that allow pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions for any reason. Executive director of the New Hampshire Board of Pharmacy, Paul Boisseau, said, however, that the pharmacist should refer the patient to an alternate dispensary. The same policy is held by the American Pharmacists Association, which, although allowing a "conscience clause," requires pharmacists to refer patients to an alternative source.
Pharmacists for Life International president Karen Brauer told local WMUR Channel 9 News that requiring pharmacists to refer the patient to someone who will fill the prescription is "stupid." "If we're not going to kill a human being, we're not going to help the customer go do it somewhere else," she argued.
Source: LifeSiteNews.com