ACLU Sues to Force Pro-Life Pharmacist to Dispense Drug That Could Cause Abortion

State   |   Micaiah Bilger   |   Nov 13, 2017   |   1:19PM   |   Albuquerque, NM

A New Mexico pharmacy is facing a lawsuit after one of its employees refused to fill a prescription that they thought might be used to abort an unborn baby.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit against a Walgreens in Albuquerque, New Mexico earlier this year, claiming the business discriminated against its client, a teenage girl, KOAT News reports.

For years now, the pro-abortion legal group has been trying to break down conscience protection rights through lawsuits against pharmacies, hospitals and other groups.

In the latest case, the ACLU said a teenager went to a Walgreens on Coors Boulevard and Montano Road, Albuquerque, to fill a prescription that she was supposed to take the night before getting an IUD birth control device. The teen’s mother said she went to the pharmacy to pick up the prescription, but the pharmacist refused to sell it to her.

Walgreens has a conscience protection policy for its employees that allows them to “step away from completing a transaction to which they may have a moral objection.” However, the company said the employee is supposed to refer the transaction to another employee who is willing to fill the prescription.

The ACLU maintains that the pharmacy discriminated against the teen.

Here’s more from the report:

“The pharmacist denied service to them because he didn’t approve of their reproductive health care decisions,” said American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico Director, Micah McCoy.

The pharmacist told the mother he “had a pretty good idea” what the medicine would be used for, court documents said.

In the documents, the patient suspected the pharmacist wouldn’t sell her the medicine because he thought it would be used for an abortion. …

“If a pharmacist because of his or her religious beliefs doesn’t want to fill a prescription they can hand it off to someone else, but in this case the plaintiff was saying there was no one else to do it,” said KOAT Legal Analyst, John Day.

Here’s more from the Albuquerque Journal:

The organizations say the pharmacist last summer refused to fill one of three prescriptions related to an IUD insertion scheduled for the following day. The pharmacist told the girl’s mother she’d have to have the prescription filled at another pharmacy because filling it was against his “personal beliefs,” according to the groups.

The medication, Misoprostol, is commonly prescribed for ulcer treatment in addition to reproductive health issues. It also can be used to induce an abortion.

The ACLU, which works closely with the abortion industry, has tried to force organizations and businesses to violate their religious beliefs before. So far, it has not been successful. For example, in 2016, the ACLU lost an attempt to force Catholic hospitals to refer patients for abortions.

However, it is not giving up. In October, the pro-abortion legal group filed a lawsuit in Hawaii that has the potential to force every pharmacy in America to sell abortion drugs. In the lawsuit, the ACLU argues that the FDA is restricting women’s access to abortion by requiring that the abortion drug be dispensed at a medical facility under the supervision of a certified provider (not necessarily even a doctor), KHON News 2 reports. The pro-abortion legal group wants the FDA to make pharmacies give out the abortion drug mifeprex, also known as mifepristone or RU-486.