clevermanka | Make it go away

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politics

Make it go away

I'd like to thank

blndbmbshltr for helping to raise my bloodpressure this morning by pointing out this little news tidbit:
Did you know pharmacists can deny you prescribed medications based on the pharmacist's religious beliefs? Two states already have this law in effect--Arkansas and South Dakota. Ten states are considering similar legislation--Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin. Story Here

Personally, I feel that if they're going to let pharmacists restrict certain drugs based on individual ethics, then they should also let pharmacists distribute certain drugs based on individual ethics. "Good morning, Mr. Goldstein, how's that wacky weed helping the old glaucoma? Good! Good. Glad to hear it. Another dime bag for you and the missus, then?"

The squirrels are quite rowdy today. They're racing around fast enough to make the ceiling tiles shake. Sounds like they're having a great time up there. Probably because they don't have to deal with bullshit religious right wackos taking over their fucking country.

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Though it's abhorrent, it seems evident that the practice of pharmacists denying people health care because of religious beliefs is at least established and fairly widespread. Here (http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/news/state/033004_APstate_birthcontrol.html) is an article about an uproar caused a few months ago by a Texas pharmacist who denied a woman (who had been raped and had a prescription for) the "morning-after" pill.

No, there's no need for standardization or secularization of our national HEALTH CARE policies!

I really can't get too upset over this (and can't be called anything near 'religious'). I consider it under the same heading as a store choosing what it will sell and what it won't. You are saying that, just because a person is selling medicine, they can have NO CHOICE over what they stock. I can't think of any mercantile business that is told 'you WILL sell this'. Capitalism strongly pushes selling anything you can get away with, but that doesn't mean the government can say you HAVE to. Now, if the government starts selling all medicine, THEY would be expected to sell anything legal, but private citizens? No.

I understand your point, but picture this scenario: Small town, conservative owner of the only drug store in the area. Being a small town, most citizens don't have a health insurance policy that covers mail order prescriptions (if they have health insurance at all). Where do these people get their birth control?

From the next town over. Or, they could boycott their local pharmacy completely until he or she was willing to offer BC. That's just the way free enterprise works.

From the next town over.

Lots of people don't have cars, and in remote rural areas, the next town over might be 20 or 30 miles. That's a long way to go on a bicycle. In August. In western Nebraska. And as far as boycotting, well they'd have to boycott sexual activity, too. I don't think that's right. Plus, it's not just about birth control. As

stimps points out, what if a pharmacist doesn't feel his religion sanctions distrubuting brain meds?

That's just the way free enterprise works

Perhaps so, but I don't think that's they way our healthcare system should work.

Like I said it's doctors also. So if your obgyn refuses to prescribe birth control then you would have to change doctors. This may not seem like a big deal but I am tired of peoples religious beliefs interfering with my RIGHTS. What if some religious group decided that women should stay home, raise kids, and OBEY their husband because it is their religious belief. What happens when you go apply for a job and don't get it because the person feels a moral obligation to keep women at home "where they belong"?

It goes far deeper than this and the consequences will be staggering.

If your doctor or your phamacist is doing this THEN YOU HAVE THE WRONG DOCTOR OR PHARMACIST. Please don't insist the government steps on the (religious) freedoms of someone ELSE just so you aren't inconvinienced. Because that is what you are really asking.

They have the right to practice their religion as long as it's not interfering with my rights. Where do we draw the line? Is it okay as long as it's only Christianity that we have to worry about.

Personally, I go to the Veterans Affairs Hospital and don't have a problem getting contraceptives, thank God!

This goes far beyond being inconvenienced.

Well, here's where we may have our problem. I don't consider healthcare or medicine a 'right'. I don't consider having a job a 'right', either, for that matter.....

This is also the kind of thing that leads to the next infringement and so on. A few scenarios you can expect to arise if this goes on:

Doctors and pharmacists can deny you information about medical options because they don't agree with it (or their interpretation of religion doesn't).

Doctors and pharmacists can do things because their religion insists on it. For example, "female circumcision" (which, by the way, is a misnomer: It's genital mutilation, as opposed to male circumcision; results in the female usually unable to achieve orgasm... which is the goal).

Young people no longer have access to birth control. "Good," says the relgious fanatic. Then we have AIDS etc. and childhood pregnancies. I don't get those nuts who think kids will stop having sex because their parents' religion says they shouldn't use birth control... huh?

I could go on and on. If we say, "it's just free market" or something, we allow the nutcases to take over our system. The real solution is to make health care something available to everyone as part of our right as a citizen. Then it would be illegal for, say, snake-handlers to apply venom to cure whatever ills their clients.

Chris

And the list could go on and on......

"We" don't have a problem at all. You are entitled to believe what you want.

I personally think this is something that will gain momentum in many different shapes and forms and maybe, even one day, it may even affect you. But by then, it might be too late.

First off, I just don't see nearly every pharmacist in the country suddenly deciding they don't believe in BC. I don't even see a large number of them doing it. So the arguement there is specious. Allowing people to follow their beliefs when it comes to what they offer isn't a slippery slope. The opposite is. Your rights aren't being impinged on under the current system. You are asking that the pharmacists be, though.

As for healthcare (and medical supplies) being a 'right'. It's a SERVICE. As a service, the provider can expect to be paid. Not only that, it's a SPECIALIZED SERVICE, meaning the provider can expect to be paid a premium. If healthcare (and medical supplies) is made into a 'right' then it MUST be provided. Either the providers become slaves, or the government does all the providing (which really doesn't strike me as a very good idea, actually) By the way, even if the government DOES start supplying healthcare, you will STILL pay for it. And you will likely pay MORE unless you are a particularly sickly individual.

I wasn't referring specifically to the Birth control issue in that last post. I was mainly referring to the way that religious beliefs are attacking certain freedoms. Sure medical care isn't a right, it should be, but that's an issue for another debate.

I do understand your point, though. Case closed.

You said, uptopic, that you're not a particularly religious person. Well, your faith in the free market (sorry, should that be Free Market?) is touching, really.

By the way, even if the government DOES start supplying healthcare, you will STILL pay for it. And you will likely pay MORE unless you are a particularly sickly individual.

You assume, first of all, that under socialized medicine base costs will remain the same--that's just not so. For example, state governments currently pay less for prescription medications because they buy them in bulk, giving the states the advantage of volume discounts and leverage over drug suppliers. Likewise, socialized health care means that service costs—physicians' salaries among them—wouldn't remain at their current astronomical levels.

More importantly, free market ideology (what we used to call unrestrained capitalism) is amoral: it completely ignores the notion of equity as a factor for the public good. Health care is different from consumer goods. Health care, like police and fire service, and military readiness, is a matter of life and death, not merely consumer choice. Socialized medicine spreads the cost of the infrastructure, services and goods over the entire tax base. More people pay, but individually they pay less. This is not only morally correct, it is good public policy. It promotes social stability and gives all citizens a stake in the system.

Suppose you live next door to a former Navy SEAL or Army Delta operator. He says, “The police should be privatized. I don’t need police protection: I have a house full of guns, an alarm system, and an attack dog. Anyone who tries to take my stuff away from me, or hurt my family, is going to take a dirt nap. Too bad if those wusses next door can’t take care of themselves—I shouldn’t have to pay for their inability to defend themselves.”

The answer, of course, is that we believe the government should ensure justice. (By the way, as we’re seeing in Iraq right now, the lack of individual security inhibits commerce.) Why is that less important when it comes to health care?

You know, that's something you don't hear in the healthcare debate:

Socialized medicine spreads the cost of the infrastructure, services and goods over the entire tax base. More people pay, but individually they pay less. This is not only morally correct, it is good public policy. It promotes social stability and gives all citizens a stake in the system.

And why not? Why don't its proponents in politics state this? Are they afraid it'll make socialized health care (heaven forfend) HAPPEN?

Chris

Actually, for people with health insurance, it's already happening.

Can anyone name a socialized healthcare system that actually provides excellent high level care (not just basic care). I have heard nothing but horror stories about the British system.

I think

stimps is pretty happy with the program in Canada...but I don't want to speak for her.

Our system RAWKS. Absolutely. The way it works is, everyone registers for Pharmacare. Based on your income, you pay X amount for your meds up to a maximum of $1000 per year (at which point Pharmacare covers even more than it already does). Most poor people never pay much at all (fimmtiu is a student, and pays on the average about $20 every 2 months for his Prozac).

HJ's work insurance on top of this means that we pay nothing for meds (which would be about $700 a month for just me), and we don't pay for tests unless they aren't doctor-prescribed. The last couple times I had surgery, we didn't pay a thing. Sure, sometimes you have to wait a couple months to see a specialist, but they will advance anyone who's in major trouble up the queue.

They're thinking of privatizing some aspects of medical care here, and I am doing everything I can to fight against it.

Yeah, that sounds like a terrible system. What a bunch of commies.

...I need an emoticon for *eyeroll*

Hee hee! =D

Yeah, that got a big laugh here, too.

We'll have to wait and see how Iraq works it's healthcare system since in their constitution healthcare is a right.

Fifth bullet from the top:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39791-2004Mar8_2.html

Well, stimps responds to this below, but I'm guessing you're on someone's insurance. I recently lost my work-provided insurance and have had to survey what's out there. Lemme tell ya, socialized medicine along the lines of what they have in Canada sounds great now. I would have to pay more than $800/month for the coverage I used to have, not including co-pays, co-insurance, deductables, non-covered stuff, and so on. Holy mackeral!

I suspect you've been talking to neo-cons; they're the only ones who have been saying socialized health care is bad, because of course this would harm their insurance friends.

Chris

Chris, I think

chernobylred hit the nail on the head a bit downtopic with her "commies" remark: anything with the word social in it has become a curse in American political life. Soon public schools will be teaching Freedom Studies instead of Social Studies.

It's a terrifingly slippery slope.

Holy crap. The implications are staggering. I mean, what if your pharmacist is a scientologist, and you have schizophrenia, or depression, or whatever? "Sorry, bud, toddle off and get wacky, I don't believe in that psychiatric booshwah." I'd start up an underground railroad of birth control from Canada. =)

an underground railroad of birth control from Canada

Frighteningly enough, unless things turn around quickly, I don't think this would be unheard of.

That thought has occurred to me before. See Miscarriage of Justice (http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2004/03/24/life_sciences/).

It's not just pharmacists. Doctors are doing the same thing. And I think to myself, "It's only the beginning" and I wait for what's next to come. Ughhh.

Great LJ name and rockin' icon, by the way!

Chris

Thanks!

I think it would make a difference if it is a private pharmacy or the pharmacy of a public hospital. I don't have a problem with a private pharmacy deciding what to stock. In C/U there are two hosptials - one is Catholic hospital and the other is not. There are procedures you can get done at one and not the other, there are likely perscirptions you can get at one and not the other.

That would make sense -- but there would need to be a provision that says "only in towns where a publicly accessible facility provides the needed services and medications."

Problem is, most hospitals are privately held.

Chris

I would be okay with rulings such as "To qualify for being a federal perscirtpion fund provider you must provide these medications..." or for an insurance comany to make those requirments to do business with a pharmacy

(deleted comment)

My concern is what do you do when you find a doctor that will prescribe birth control but won't prescribe painkillers? ( I use that example because I do take hydrocodone for my fibromyalgia). Then you find a doctor that will prescribe both but won't prescribe antidepressants. Geez, it could go on forever.

Well, that's exactly what happens anyway. I see three (soon to be four) doctors currently...

One treats my thyroid condition (secondary hypothyroidism, which other doctors "don't believe in") and prescribes my benzodiazepam drug which no other doctor will as they "believe" that I will get addicted.

Two is my gynecologist, who treats me for my ovarian cysts and is the one prescribing my birth control... she diagnosed me with diabetes, but won't treat my diabetes because it's not her specialty, so I'm off to see...

Three, my ("primary care physician") other doctor to treat me for the diabetes (which may result in a referral to an endocrinologist...), as well as the person who prescribes for me antibiotics when I need them...

Four, the infectious disease specialist is the one who'll be prescribing my long-term anti-viral therapy, because none of the above physicians "believes" in the efficacy of treating chronic re-occurring non-simplex herpes viruses with anti-viral meds.

*sigh*

I want one doctor. ONE. I want one doctor who has a nurse/midwife to perform my gynecological exams, and who will consult with specialists when needed, but be the main person who prescribes all of my medicine. Instead, I have to see Four doctors, and may be adding a fifth (endocrinologist). Not only does this all cost me more money (a $20 co-pay for each visit), but it costs my insurance carrier more, because they've got to pay four doctors, when they could just be paying one.

And that doesn't change the fact that I get my drugs from three different places, either. I use a compounding pharmacy in KC to get one of my thyroid meds, and the BCPs come from my gynecologist (cheaper there), while the rest of my meds I get from Wal-Mart.

If I had more energy, I'd shop around to find someplace where I could get my meds all at one place, where it's cheapest, but that would be very inconvenient (because that's the way it works, folks).

Anyone who says that our current health care system is effective is wrong.

(This is why I'm planning on getting my PhD in Public Health.)

Wow. After readin that I guess I'm pretty fortunate since my GYN is my primary healthcare provider and prescribes all of my medication except my anti-depressants which I see my mental health provider for. But, as I mentioned, I get seen at the VA hospital since I'm a disabled veteran so I'm not out there dealing with the private healthcare system.

Good luck on getting your PHD! I'm rooting for ya!

Thanks. :)

A friend and I recently had a conversation that went along the lines of...
"But I thought you got your MSW (masters in social work) to help people?"

me:"I did. But I don't want to help individual people. I want to change the world."

them:"Good luck with that."

hehe

My brother has his Masters in Social Work and after 15 years of doing that he took a break and left to teach English in China.

It's very demanding work. I don't even know if I would have lasted half as long, especially since he worked with abused children.

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beware letting the fanatics set a wedge...

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Faith

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