Joel Connelly Spouts Ignorance

Joel Connelly's column on Sunday takes the side of pharmacists who are forced against their poor fragile sensibilities to disburse emergency contraceptives. He cites a poor pharmacist who:

... is able to practice her profession thanks to an injunction by U.S. District Judge Ronald Leighton, who suspended a state regulation. It requires pharmacies to dispense Plan B and permits individual pharmacists to decline only if a fellow worker on hand at the same store will supply the drug.

Connelly concudes:

I'd argue for a policy of conscience and respect. The pharmacist should not be forced into a Hobson's choice: Violate conscience or pay the penalty of losing your job.

And then Connelly states: that a

. . . scribe can write a column sympathetic to the pro-life viewpoint.

Here's my response that I sent to him:

Unfortunately you have the facts wrong in your column of February 1, 2009. The morning after pill does not cause an abortion. It does not kill a fetus or even a blastemas. Plan B or Levonorgestrel simply prevents a pregnancy after unprotected sex or contraceptive failure. It is NOT an abortion pill and cannot terminate an existing pregnancy. Certain groups who are against contraceptives have deliberately used framing and word choices to tie their cause with the more emotional anti-abortion cause and have almost successfully confused the 2 issues. You have fallen victim to their confusing rhetoric.

Also being "anti-abortion" is not automatically "pro-life". Just as being "pro-choice" is not "anti-life". Again, you are confusing the rhetoric of groups with an agenda with facts.

Finally I wonder if your support for "a policy of conscience and respect" would extend to an anesthesiologist who doesn't believe in administering drugs? Or a pediatrician who cannot in good conscience provide vaccinations? Or a veterinarian who refuses to euthanize even dangerously sick animals?

If people cannot in good conscience do their job, in my opinion, they should find another field.