Selective Morality in the Workplace

The New York Times has an editorial saying exactly what I have said long before now: if your sense of morality does not allow you to fully discharge the duties of your job, find a new line of work that conforms to your moral compass. Pharmacists who refuse to fill legally written prescriptions for medicine that a physician has deemed necessary and appropriate for that patient have no business behind a pharmacy counter. Margaret Sanger was arrested for distributing birth control devices, but family planning is legal now, and should be available to any patient with a legally written prescription and no contraindications, no matter what the personal beliefs of the pharmacist.

Not saying, of course, that pharmacists should be just prescription vending machines. Pharmacists play a vital role in the delivery of health care, even more so now that doctors don't have or take the time to fully explain the treatment regimen they prescribe. The pharmacist my family went to while I was growing up was just as important to our family's medical care as our physicians were. When a medication I had to take caused intolerable nausea, my pharmacist was the one who told us how to minimize the discomfort and potential harm, allowing me to continue my treatment. When another person's allergy medication failed to work, the pharmacist was the one who discerned that one of the inert ingredients in the pill was the allergen for which the medication was being prescribed. In the days before databases, he knew what my family should never take, but that decision was based entirely on our medical needs, not his moral judgment.

I find it odd that all the refusals to fill prescriptions based on moral values is confined to birth control and emergency contraception. Gluttony is one of the seven deadly sins, but these pharmacists seem to have no problem dispensing weight loss drugs or cholesterol lowering medications that help people avoid the consequences of chronic gluttony. Even if the pharmacists' moral compass is confined strictly to curtailing the consequence-free indulgence of our lust, though, should we not also be hearing more about people being denied prescriptions for Viagra and Cialis, or is it just women who aren't allowed to have sex on their terms?