Barbara W
Extract
The assignment: to buy the drug in a small, remote town where I was sojourning on business. If I could not get the pill in this straight-talking, hard- working place, who could? . . . approached a smiling pharmacy worker and asked for Plan B. . . . Kevin refused to hand it over. Only a pharmacist could give me the drug. He was a pharmacist’s assistant; the real pharmacist was on her break. . . . When I returned at 5:30, Kevin, the man of steely resolve, informed me that the pharmacist had left for the day. No pharmacist, no Plan B. [Pharmacist assistant seems to have answered questions evasively] . . . Was this not a nonprescription drug. Yes. Why could I not purchase the drug if no prescription was necessary? And then he said it: “Because, ethically, I don’t believe in it and I would not give it to you anyway. It is against my principles, and I don’t have to do anything I am uncomfortable with,” he said loudly and proudly. . . According to Kevin, there is nothing unprofessional about placing personal conviction ahead of a woman’s health care needs. . . a reasonably articulate curmudgeon like myself cannot obtain emergency contraception, what chance does a worried, upset teenage girl have?
Barbara W. Counter attack. Can Med Assoc. J. 2006;174(2):211-212.