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As simple as ABC
by Judie Brown
Released June 14, 2007
Commentary by Judie Brown
Bipartisan efforts in Congress
always challenge my imagination. While I am aware that politics is the art of
compromise, I have never understood how elected officials can honestly say
they’re doing their job when they choose political unity over doing what is
right. When bipartisanship takes over, both sides of the political aisle seem
to agree on something that thrills neither side but provides politicians with
the opportunity to claim unity. That can be the only explanation as to why members
of both parties are saluting a new proposal, the Access to Birth Control Act-or
the ABC Act in Capitol Hill parlance.
This proposal is really threatening
because it would deny pharmacists the right to follow their consciences as they
carry out their duties. Specifically, it singles out pharmacists who refuse to
fill birth control prescriptions. Never mind that these healthcare
professionals understand that their true responsibility is dispensing drugs designed
to help those who are ill. No, the purpose of this legislation is to force them
to dispense medication to healthy people who wish to avoid certain undesired
consequences of their sexual activities.
What is it about birth control
that a growing number of pharmacists find problematic? In a nutshell it’s the
fact that most so-called contraceptives can kill a preborn child before he’s had
a chance to implant in his mother’s womb.
Rep.
Carolyn Maloney of New York, one of the congressional sponsors of the Access to
Birth Control Act, told a gathering of feminists and media types, “An American
woman can decide to put her life on the line for our country in Iraq, but she
can be prevented from making basic decisions about her own health here at
home.” Maloney further claimed that “Access to birth control is a women’s
health issue, a private matter and a constitutional right. No one-not
pharmacists, politicians or religious leaders-should be able to tamper with
that right.”
It’s
difficult to understand how she can compare the creation of a new life in the
womb with the war in Iraq. On the one hand we have a mother who is carrying a
special gift that is anything but a health hazard; on the other hand we have a woman
who has freely chosen to join the military knowing that she may have to put her
life on the line for her country. Both motherhood and military service are
noble endeavors; but what does either have to do with this misguided attempt to
justify the killing of tiny human beings in the first days of embryonic life?
In case Rep.
Maloney has not noticed, there is nothing in the Constitution that guarantees anyone
the right to “protected” sex. The Constitution provides our nation with the
guidelines necessary to defend and protect the people of this nation; it has
neither article nor amendment addressing her proposed mandate that pharmacists medicate
the healthy so they may satisfy their sexual appetites regardless of the
possibility of pregnancy.
What we
do have in America is the right to expect to be treated in a way that is
commensurate with our safety and the safety of this nation’s progeny. The birth
control pill provides neither. They are not safe for those who use them and
they can be deadly for those who are conceived while those pills are being
employed.
Sen.
Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, co-author of the ABC proposal, told the same
gathering, “No woman should be denied the medicine she needs to stay healthy. This
bill is about basic health care for women in the 21st century, care that
shouldn’t be withheld by pharmacists with an agenda. Passing this legislation
would ensure that women get the care they need and the care that their doctors
determine is necessary.”
Once
again, political types, carrying the water for the proponents of unfettered
sexual activity, describe the possibility of pregnancy as a health hazard and suggest
that pharmacists who cherish life, appreciate parenthood and understand the
problematic nature of birth control are somehow mean spirited ogres with an
agenda. It is not the pharmacists, who know the truth and do not want to be a
party to abortion, who have an agenda; rather it is those who hold promiscuity
and abortion in such high regard that some actually treat them as sacred.
“Safe and
legal” are the buzz words upon which the architects of the culture of death
have built their house of cards. These people have convinced the public that
birth control has nothing to do with abortion, and they have argued in vain
that birth control actually curtails the number of abortions. In the process, “safe
and legal” practices have condemned millions of preborn babies to death and
have jeopardized the lives of countless numbers of women. At whatever point
these realities finally come to the attention of the unknowing, apathetic
public, one wonders what a terrible price the advocates of these deadly
practices will have to pay.
For now,
though, it is clear that pharmacists are going to have to make a choice, take a
stand, and do what is right and good for those who come to them with
prescriptions. Pharmacists, if this bill ever becomes law, will be punished for
caring more about the ethical practice of their profession than they do for the
“safe and legal” hogwash that has come to be accepted by far too many in our
midst.
I do,
however, have a caution for all those who are working so hard to defeat this
measure. Please stop talking about what these courageous pharmacists “believe”
and start talking about what they know, clinically, to be the facts. There is
no belief whatsoever involved with the fact that basic biology has not changed:
a human embryonic child exists at the instant the sperm and the egg unite. The
chemicals contained in most birth control methods will make it impossible for
that child to complete his task and implant in his mother’s womb. These are
facts, not “religious beliefs” as is often alleged by the promoters of such
legislation.
Give
pharmacists credit for understanding the truth and wanting to practice their
trade ethically. As Pharmacists for Life International has stated, it is crucial
“to make pharmacy once again a life-saving profession, a mooring from which it
has drifted.”
For my
money, it is high time for pharmacists to stand up and proclaim that they will
commit to helping anyone who is ill; but they will simply refuse to provide
perfectly healthy Americans with medications that may kill innocent human
beings and possibly maim those who use them.
If the
true concern is “safe and legal,” then members of Congress are considering the
wrong ABC. They should drop the language of the Access to Birth Control bill and
be more focused on Applying Biology Correctly.
Release issued: 14 Jun 07
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