OBJECTIONABLE

Walgreens Pharmacist Denied Woman Medication to Induce Miscarriage

The pharmacist refused to fill her prescription “because of his ethical beliefs,” the woman wrote.

A Walgreens pharmacist denied an Arizona woman the medication she’d been prescribed to induce a miscarriage last Thursday, according to the woman’s Facebook post that has since gone viral. The New York Times reports that after Nicole Arteaga sought misoprostol to terminate a pregnancy that would end in miscarriage her local pharmacist denied her the medication citing his “ethical beliefs.” “I stood at the mercy of this pharmacist explaining my situation in front of my 7-year-old, and five customers standing behind only to be denied because of his ethical beliefs,” Arteaga wrote in the post. “I left Walgreens in tears, ashamed and feeling humiliated by a man who knows nothing of my struggles but feels it is his right to deny medication prescribed to me by my doctor.” Walgreens said in a statement to the Times that it has apologized to Arteaga, but added that the company allows employees with “sincerely held beliefs” to “step away from filling a prescription for which they have a moral objection.” The prescription was transferred to another Walgreens, and Areteaga was able to obtain it "with no problems." The Times notes that only five other states allow pharmacists to refuse dispensing medication for religious or moral reasons.