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Illinois Pharmacists Defy Order to Fill Plan B Prescriptions

Blagojevich drug rule is questioned

By Maria Baran, Belleville New Democrat (Belleville, Illinois), December 2, 2005

Southern Illinois lawmakers question the merit of Gov. Rod Blagojevich's order that pharmacists cannot refuse to dispense the morning-after pill.

State Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Greenville, disagreed with the state rule imposed by the governor that led to a Walgreens Co. policy and the dismissal of four metro-east pharmacists.

"His executive order was out of place because if he wants to bring it before the public, he should have brought it in front of the legislature," said Stephens, a pharmacist for 30 years who is a partial owner of Prescriptions Plus in Troy and New Baden.

The Walgreens pharmacists were put on an unpaid leave Monday for declining on conscientious grounds to agree to a store policy to dispense the Plan B prescription, commonly called the morning-after pill.

Stephens called it a "rather Draconian measure" to take away jobs for religious beliefs.

The state rule requires pharmacies to fill prescriptions without delay for the set of prescription-only pills that can prevent pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of sexual intercourse by preventing a fertilized egg from attaching to the womb. Some anti-abortion activists believe life begins at fertilization, and view the prevention of implantation as a form of abortion.

That's where the Walgreens pharmacists hit a wall: They didn't want to dispense Plan B for religious reasons, but said they've never prevented patients from having their prescriptions filled by other pharmacists.

"All they have to do is have a policy that allows for dealing with these prescriptions in a timely manner," Stephens said mentioning the option to staff with multiple pharmacists or direct a patient to another store.

Stephens said the state lawmakers will deal with the rule when they go back in session after the holidays. "The governor has created a lot of anguish and totally unnecessary problems by his executive order," he said.

State Sen. Frank Watson, R-Greenville, also is a pharmacist. A representative from his office said Watson is disappointed with Walgreens' "narrow interpretation" of the law, which only states that pharmacies cannot refuse the prescription, not pharmacists.

Walgreens said pharmacists who did not agree with their policy could put the company at risk of losing its license.

The administrative rule is enforceable as law. Penalties against a pharmacy can range from a fine to revocation of its license to dispense drugs. Illinois is the only state with such a rule.

State Rep. Dan Reitz, D-Sparta, said he disagrees with both the executive order and the action taken by Walgreens.

"I think it would be in our best interest for pharmacies to work with pharmacists and find another way to accommodate their customers," he said. "I hate to see people lose their jobs over moral beliefs."

The Walgreens pharmacists have met with a lawyer to determine their legal rights. They cite the Illinois Health Care Right of Conscience Act that says workers cannot be forced "to act contrary to their conscience."

However, Rep. Tom Holbrook, D-Belleville, pointed out that pharmacists are not covered by that legislation. "In Illinois, you can't pick and choose what drugs you want to give out," he said.

"They have tried in the past to put pharmacists under the Right of Conscience Act and they have failed," he said.

Stephens and Watson share the view of the Illinois Association of Pharmacists that pharmacists are covered by that act. They say it's open to interpretation, just like any law.

That may be another issue discussed in the upcoming state legislature session, Holbrook said.

Walgreens Pharmacists File Discrimination Complaint Over Plan B Firings

By Steven Ertelt, LifeNews.com, December 8, 2005

St. Louis, MO (LifeNews.com) -- Four Walgreens pharmacists who were fired from their jobs in southern Illinois have filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, saying they were discriminated against because of their religious views on dispensing the morning after pill.

The pharmacists said they were "effectively fired" from their jobs when Walgreens put them on unpaid leave last week because they wouldn't follow a directive from Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, mandating that all pharmacists in the state fill all prescriptions for legal drugs.

That order, which has been challenged in court, would force pharmacists to dispense the Plan B drugs, which can sometimes cause an abortion.

The American Center for Law and Justice, a pro-life law firm, filed the complaint on the pharmacists' behalf.

"Since the pharmacists believe that human life begins at conception, they conclude that dispensing such drugs would require them to participate in the moral equivalent of abortion," ACLJ said in a statement.

John Menges, who worked at a Walgreens store in Collinsville, told AP, "I knew when these drugs came out I would never be able to dispense them."

Walgreens said it would help the pharmacists obtain a Missouri pharmacy license and transfer them to a drugstore across the border in St. Louis, but Menges said over the weekend he's received no such help.

Tiffani Bruce, a spokeswoman for Walgreens, which is based in Illinois, cited the April mandate from Blagojevich as the reason for the firings.

"It is strictly stated in state law that pharmacists must fill prescriptions for emergency contraceptions," Bruce told AP. "Anyone who takes issue with this law needs to address it with the state or the governor."

Bruce also claims Menges and the other pharmacists have failed to take the company up on its Missouri employment offer. Menges said he would have to take a pay cut while he obtained his Missouri license and Walgreens wouldn't promise him a store location close to his Illinois home.

Three of the pharmacists, Menges, Richard Quayle and Carol Muzzarelli, filed the complaint. A fourth has returned to work for Walgreens after agreeing to follow the governor's mandate.

Frank Manion, an ACLJ attorney, said a lawsuit was likely if the complaint yields no results and Walgreens fails to reinstate the pharmacists.

He said the action taken in this case "does not bode well for other pharmacists across the country who don't want to be compelled to participate in something that doesn't fall within their religious beliefs," Manion said. "It's important that a stand be taken here."

The local Catholic Diocese of Belleville has called for a Walgreens boycott because of its actions.

Druggist proud of Plan B stance

By Jim Suhr, Pantagraph Publishing (Bloomington-Normal, Illinois), December 18, 2005

ST. LOUIS -- Pharmacist Rich Quayle makes no apologies for refusing to dispense emergency contraception.

It's a stand that cost him his $100,000-a-year job at a Walgreen Co. pharmacy in Madison County when he refused to sign a pledge for his employer promising to dispense the medicine, sold as Plan B, in accordance with a new state rule.

Quayle and two other Metro East pharmacists were put on indefinite unpaid leave last month by Walgreen after they cited religious and ethical grounds for balking at the rule they say wrongly forces them to dispense the morning-after pill.

Proponents of the rule -- made permanent by Gov. Rod Blagojevich in August -- say it guarantees women's access to legal birth control.

"People try to paint us as being religious zealots," Quayle, 54, said from his home in Highland. "I have firm religious beliefs, and I choose not to destroy a human being. I don't think that's necessarily a bad moral stance to take."

The rule requires pharmacies that sell federally approved contraceptives to fill prescriptions for emergency birth control "without delay" if they have the medication in stock. If the contraceptive is not in stock, the pharmacy must order it or transfer the prescription to another pharmacy of the patient's choice. If a pharmacist won't fill the prescription because of a moral objection, another pharmacist must be available there to fill it.

Tracy Fischman, vice president for public policy at Planned Parenthood in the Chicago area, said the rule has curbed what she said was frequent refusal by pharmacists to fill prescriptions for emergency contraception.

"We do believe that it's absolutely critical that pharmacies have systems that ensure that women can get prescriptions filled without discrimination and without delay. That is what this rule does," she said.

Last month, Deerfield-based Walgreen asked its pharmacists to pledge in writing to fill such prescriptions. The company suspended Quayle and three colleagues on Nov. 28 when they refused to sign. One of those pharmacists later agreed to dispense the contraceptives and has since returned to work.

Walgreen spokeswoman Tiffani Bruce said the company had no choice but to discipline the pharmacists because violating the rule could jeopardize the licenses of the pharmacies where they worked and of the sites' chief pharmacists.

The American Center for Law and Justice, a group founded by evangelist Pat Robertson, has taken up the case of the three. In a recent filing with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in St. Louis, the Washington D.C.-based group accused Walgreen of religious discrimination by "effectively firing" the pharmacists.

The ACLJ has said a state or federal lawsuit is likely if Walgreen doesn't reinstate the pharmacists. Several lawsuits have been filed on behalf of pharmacists and pharmacy owners who oppose the rule.

For Quayle and others who believe that life begins at conception, the morning-after pill is little different from an abortion. The high dose of regular birth control can prevent fertilization or block a fertilized egg from attaching to the womb. "The media has painted us as a bunch of rogues and uncaring individuals, and that couldn't be farther from the truth," said Quayle.

"I like helping people. But I'm not there to kill anybody, and I won't do it."

Quayle believes his refusal to follow the rule is protected by the Illinois Health Care Right of Conscience Act, which he says protects workers from being forced to act contrary to their conscience.

"If the Right of Conscience law means nothing and religious beliefs mean nothing, we're in a lot of trouble," said Quayle, who is looking for a new job.

Blagojevich spokeswoman Abby Ottenhoff said the "right of conscience does not apply to pharmacists."

"In general, the aim was to give medical professionals who may be in a position to perform an abortion the right to abstain from doing so. We fully support that right, but a pharmacist is not asked to perform abortions. He's asked to fill prescriptions," she said.

Pharmacies don't have to comply with the state rule if they don't stock any contraceptives.

Quayle said he has no qualms about dispensing regular birth-control pills, but the morning-after pill, he says, "is not your typical birth control."

"If you prevent the egg from implanting in the uterus you prevent that from becoming a human being," he said. "If I give her this medication, that medication is designed to eliminate one of those lives, and that's a position I choose not to participate in."

Druggists suspended in debate over pill

By Leah Thorsen, St. Louis Post-Dispatch November 29, 2005

Pharmacist John Menges became accustomed to filling as many as 40 birth-control prescriptions while working the night shift at the Walgreens in Collinsville, he said Tuesday.

But Menges, an anti-abortion Catholic who lives in Edwardsville, said he drew the line at dispensing emergency contraception commonly known as the morning-after pill because he views it as a form of abortion.

That's why he referred women to other stores where he knew pharmacists would fill those prescriptions.

That refusal is why he was one of four Metro East pharmacists put on indefinite unpaid leave by Walgreens Co. on Monday.

Illinois mandates that pharmacies fill all prescriptions for contraception, including emergency contraception, if the medication is in stock. The morning-after pill prevents ovulation or fertilization of an egg.

Pharmacists employed by Walgreens in other states, including Missouri, can choose not to fill the prescriptions, said Walgreens spokesman Michael Polzin.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich filed the emergency rule April 1 requiring pharmacies to fill prescriptions for Food and Drug Administration-approved contraception.

That rule, the only one of its kind in the nation, became permanent in August.

"If a woman has a prescription for contraceptives, they ought to be filling that," Blagojevich said of pharmacy obligations while in Edwardsville on Tuesday.

Blagojevich said the four pharmacists' suspensions were unfortunate, but that protecting women's rights was more important.

The state has filed four complaints against pharmacies for allegedly violating the rule since it went into effect April 1, said Susan Hofer, a spokeswoman for the state's Department of Financial and Professional Regulation.

Two of the complaints were against Walgreens stores in West Peoria and Chicago.

These complaints were one reason that Walgreens decided to require its roughly 1,000 pharmacists in Illinois to sign forms stating they would fill all contraception prescriptions, said Polzin.

As of Tuesday, the four Metro East pharmacists were the only ones in Illinois who had refused to sign the agreement, although the deadline to turn them in is not until next month.

Even a delay dispensing the contraception is a violation of the state regulation, Polzin said, which is why Walgreens wanted to make sure women received the medication promptly.

Polzin would not identify the other three Metro East pharmacists put on indefinite leave, or where they worked, but said they can be transferred to a Missouri pharmacy.

Menges, 39, said he had not been offered another job with Walgreens, but that he had received three job offers from Illinois pharmacies. Menges said he makes about $100,000 a year at Walgreens, and is getting married in two weeks.

He's determined to change the Illinois mandate - Menges is one of six Southern Illinois pharmacists who have sued to end the state's rule.

He said he doesn't judge anyone for their beliefs, and that it's unfair that Walgreens penalized him for his moral values.

Said Menges: "I think they made the wrong decision."

Be the governor, not a lawmaker

Belleville News Democrat (Belleville, Illinois), December 17, 2005

Gov. Rod Blagojevich's ill-advised decision to tell pharmacies how to run their business has a lot of people in Illinois calling for Plan B. And we don't mean the morning-after pill.

Blagojevich wanted to ensure that women could get the controversial pill, also known as Plan B. But rather than have lawmakers take up the issue, he decided to issue his own edict. Earlier this year he handed down an executive order that pharmacists cannot refuse to dispense the morning-after pill -- making Illinois the only state in the nation to have such a rule.

Regardless of what you think about the morning- after pill, this is the wrong way to make law. And why, with so many pressing concerns in Illinois, is Blagojevich focused on this relatively minor issue?

We're just now starting to see the ramifications of the governor's "I'm in charge" actions.

Four metro-east pharmacists from Walgreen's may soon be out of a job because they object to dispensing Plan B on moral grounds. Pre-edict, that wasn't a big deal for Walgreen's. In other states, the company still either has another pharmacist who doesn't object fill the prescription, or sends people to a nearby pharmacy that will fill it. But thanks to Blagojevich's actions, those are no longer options in Illinois.

Lawmakers hope to approve a Plan B of their own during the next legislative session, to replace the governor's inflexible order with a law that accommodates people on both sides of the issue.

The four pharmacists looking forward to Christmas without a paycheck could have been spared a lot of grief if this issue had be decided by lawmakers in the first place.

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