[Pflienews] PharmFacts E-News Update: IL supremes to rule on Conscience Rights today; HHS regs published

Thu Dec 18 09:30:13 MST 2008

*PharmFacts E-News Update -- 18 Dec 2008 AD

*

/_*Read the new Conscience Clause Regs in their entirety... 
<http://www.federalregister.gov/OFRUpload/OFRData/2008-30134_PI.pdf>
*_/

/_*

/_*HHS RIGHTS OF CONSCIENCE RULES PROMULGATED; 'MAN OF THE YEAR' 
PROMISES TO REVERSE...*_/ 
<http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2008/12/17/obama-team-reverse-bush-era-abortion-rules/>*_/

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*_IL supremes to rule on Pharmacist Conscience Rights today... 
<http://www.sj-r.com/homepage/x1720700057/Supreme-court-to-rule-today-on-dispensing-Plan-B> 

_*

  Supreme court to rule today on dispensing Plan B emergency contraception

    Governor's order allowing [so-called] "morning-after" pill at stake

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By DEAN OLSEN <mailto:dean.olsen at sj-r.com>
*THE STATE JOURNAL-REGISTER*
Posted Dec 17, 2008 @ 11:31 PM
Last update Dec 18, 2008 @ 05:57 AM
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Depending on their ideology, opponents and supporters of Gov. Rod 
['Slobodan'] Blagojevich's April 2005 order requiring pharmacies to fill 
prescriptions for emergency contraception were hopeful or worried 
Wednesday as they awaited today's expected Illinois Supreme Court 
decision on a challenge to the order.

The decision will be "huge for pharmacy owners who have this belief," 
said Francis Manion, an attorney for two men who want the high court to 
rule that pharmacy owners are exempt from the order because of their 
religious beliefs.

But if the court overturns the rule, Pam Sutherland, chief executive of 
the Illinois Planned Parenthood Council, fears that people seeking 
[abortifacient so-called] "morning-after" pills will once again be 
turned down by some pharmacists who view the medicine [sic] as a form of 
abortion.

"I'm afraid we will see women be made victims just for trying to get 
their prescriptions filled," she said.

['Slobodan'] Blagojevich made Illinois the first state in the country to 
require that pharmacies fill prescriptions for emergency contraception, 
commonly sold under the trade name Plan B, or face discipline.

Plan B is a concentrated dose of the same compounds used in conventional 
birth-control pills. It is up to 90 percent effective in [...chemically 
aborting a]  pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of unprotected sex. 
Doctors say both Plan B and regular birth-control pills primarily work 
by preventing ovulation --- the release of an unfertilized egg [sic] 
from the ovaries.

But the medicines also can work by changing the lining of the uterus so 
a fertilized egg [sic] can't implant.

Plan B is different from [mifepsirtone], the so-called abortion pill, 
which causes an implanted egg [sic] to dislodge. But some pharmacists 
and pharmacy owners object to dispensing Plan B because they consider it 
more likely than regular birth control pills to prevent implantation --- 
a situation some say is akin to abortion [and confirmed by the FDA and 
the drug maker Barr].

Before the governor issued his order, Sutherland said, Planned 
Parenthood would receive several calls every month from Illinois women 
complaining that pharmacists were refusing to fill their 
emergency-contraception prescriptions.

Those complaints have almost disappeared since the rule went into 
effect, "so we know that the rule is working," she said.

Pharmacists became less involved in dispensing Plan B to some customers 
after the Food and Drug Administration in 2006 made Plan B available 
without prescriptions to people 18 and older. But Sutherland said the 
Illinois rule still is important for ensuring that people younger than 
18 have access to the medicine.

Manion, who presents pharmacists and pharmacy owners Luke Vander Bleek 
of Morrison and Glenn Kosirog of Wheaton, said pharmacies are covered by 
the Illinois Health Care Right of Conscience Act.

*If the high court accepts Manion's logic, the court could strike down 
Blagojevich's rule or send the pharmacy owners' appeal back to Sangamon 
County Circuit Court, where the original challenge began in 2005.*

Sangamon County Circuit Judge John Belz dismissed the challenge without 
ruling on the right of conscience issue. An Illinois Appellate Court 
panel backed Belz.

The rule also spawned two lawsuits in Springfield's U.S. District Court. 
Both of the cases have been settled. One of those settlements, involving 
five former Walgreen Co. pharmacists, resulted in a modification of the 
Illinois rule.

The Blagojevich administration in May agreed to allow approval of Plan B 
prescriptions by an off-site pharmacist if on-site pharmacists have 
moral objections to Plan B. That way, a pharmacy technician could sell 
the medicine so patients wouldn't have to go elsewhere. The modified 
rule contains a new section also says a retail pharmacy must make its 
"best efforts" to keep emergency contraception in stock if the pharmacy 
sells any contraception.

Anjali Julka, spokeswoman for the Illinois Department of Financial and 
Professional Regulation, said she didn't know if any pharmacies have 
been disciplined for failing to stock Plan B since the modified rule 
went into effect April 16.

Dean Olsen can be reached at (217) 788-1543.

_Told ya so: FDA & Plan B manufacturer Barr admit it's an 
abortifacient.... <http://www.go2planb.com/PDF/PlanBPI.pdf>_

_
_
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