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Conscientious objection and abortifacient drugs.

Abstract：

:The legal right to assert a conscientious objection is reviewed, using as an example the dispensing of abortifacient drugs by pharmacists. The three areas of law that most significantly concern the right to assert a conscientious refusal are employment law, conscience clauses, and religious discrimination law. Each of these is reviewed, with descriptions of recent cases. It is concluded that employment law protects refusals that are consistent with public policy, but does not permit an employee's personal policy to determine how a business will be run; that conscience clauses appear to provide protection for pharmacists who object to dispensing abortifacients, but that the precise meanings of critical words and phrases in some clauses need to be defined; and that even though laws of religious discrimination require that employers accommodate religious beliefs, they may not protect a pharmacist who objects to dispensing abortifacients if the accommodation becomes unreasonably burdensome. :The right of pharmacists to conscientious objection to the dispensing of abortifacient agents such as RU-486 is examined from the perspectives of employment law, conscience clauses, and religious discrimination law. Employment law protects refusals to violate public policy or the recognized code of ethics of the employee's profession, but does not justify refusals that emanate from personal conscience. Most states have conscience clauses regarding abortion, but there is substantial variation from state to state and ambiguity in terms of whether restrictions on abortion encompass the dispensing of abortifacient drugs in a non-hospital setting. In several court cases, the conscience clause has been interpreted as applying only to those directly involved in a medical procedure. Finally, religious discrimination law, which requires employers to accommodate an employee's religious practices to the extent that undue hardship is not created for the business, is unlikely to provide protection to anti-abortion pharmacists due to difficulties in proving that "undue hardship" (e.g., reduced morale among other pharmacists) would not ensue. As the use of abortifacient drugs becomes more widespread, it will be necessary to develop systems that both accommodate personal beliefs and ensure that the needs of patients are not denied.

journal_name

Clin Ther

journal_title

Clinical therapeutics

authors

Brushwood DB

subject

Has Abstract

pub_date

1993-01-01 00:00:00

pages

204-12; discussion 168

issue

eissn

0149-2918

issn

1879-114X

journal_volume

pub_type

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Conscientious objection and abortifacient drugs.