Patients seeking drugs to treat everything from arthritis to acne at Walgreens and CVS pharmacies in states with near-total abortion bans must show proof that they’re not using them to end a pregnancy. Those who can’t are, in some cases, turned away.
Patients seeking drugs to treat everything from arthritis to acne at Walgreens and CVS pharmacies in the dozen-plus states with near-total abortion bans must show extra documentation to prove that they’re not using the drugs to end a pregnancy, the companies confirmed to POLITICO. Those who can’t are, in some cases, being turned away.
While medical and advocacy groups are struggling to gather precise data on how often this is happening, they said the reports filtering up from members are alarming. Under state and federal laws, individual pharmacists have long been able to refuse to dispense abortion pills, contraception or other medications they felt clashed with their religious beliefs — as long as they directed patients to someone else who would fill their prescription.
Asked about instances in which pharmacists aren’t able to easily determine a patient’s purpose for taking a drug, Harrison responded: “The pharmacist isn’t required to confirm whether or not someone is pregnant. They’re not licensed to make diagnoses. That’s the job of the prescriber.”federal warnings of legal consequences
Providers and patient advocates note that the extra scrutiny, delays and refusals are falling disproportionately on patients who are women of reproductive age. That delay in care can mean some people could go without medication indefinitely, said Tom Kraus, the vice president of government relations at the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists.
“Ectopic pregnancy is rare, affecting one to two percent of all pregnancies in the United States yearly. By comparison, 200,000 people are affected by lupus, 1.3 million by rheumatoid arthritis, and 7.5 million by psoriasis in the United States each year,” the Global Healthy Living Foundationearlier this month. “As a result, chronic illness patients bear most of the burden of legislation like S.B. 4,” Texas’s law that prohibits the distribution of medications that cause abortions.
And in Indiana, where state GOP leaders are fighting in court to enact the country’s first new abortion restrictions since the Supreme Court’s June ruling, abortions are allowed in cases of rape or incest during the first 10 weeks of pregnancy, when the fetus is diagnosed with a lethal anomaly, and when needed to protect the life or health of the parent. The penalty for violating the law includes the loss of one’s medical license.
And in states where abortion remains legal, providers say their patients who depend on misoprostol, mifepristone or methotrexate to treat both acute and chronic conditions are unsure of their rights in a post-“I have patients who are really scared and asking me if they should stockpile methotrexate or switch to another drug just in case,” Belinda Birnbaum, a Philadelphia-based rheumatologist, said. “And I have colleagues who feel a sense of dread every time they prescribe it.
Meanwhile, Republicans on Capitol Hill want to roll back the federal guidance altogether and give pharmacists freer rein to refuse to dispense medication if they suspect it could be used to terminate a pregnancy — even in states that have not passed anti-abortion laws.Buddy Carter
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