Woman Denied Miscarriage Prescription Due to Pharmacist’s Religion

A Roman Catholic pharmacist in Michigan refused to fill a woman’s prescription for miscarriage medicine, saying he couldn’t do it because he is “a good Catholic male.”

The woman, Rachel Peterson, told The Chicago Tribune:

“He said that he was a good Catholic male and that he couldn’t in good conscience give me this medication because it’s used for abortions, and he could not prescribe that. When you’re at one of the lowest moments of your life,  you don’t expect this sort of demeaning treatment.”

The medication, Misoprostol, is used in combination with another drug to induce labor, but can also be used against stomach ulcers. The incident took place at a pharmacy inside a Meijer supermarket. Peterson eventually went to a different Meijer location where a pharmacist did agree to fill the prescription.

To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Michigan wrote to Meijer this week complaining that the pharmacist’s action was discriminatory and violated Michigan’s public accommodations laws.

Merissa Kovach, a Michigan ACLU policy strategist, issued a statement expressing her opinion that Peterson was a victim of sex discrimination.

“Had the customer been a man prescribed the same medication, that is also commonly used to treat ulcers, the pharmacist would have filled it,” Kovach wrote in her statement.

“What we would hope is that Meijer and other pharmacies would agree that they’re allowed to accommodate the personal beliefs of their employees, but that accommodation cannot include permitting discriminatory denials of care that burden patients and customers,” Kovach told the Tribune.

The ACLU is requesting that Meijer implement a new policy that will ensure that “all pharmacy customers receive their medication without undue delay regardless of the personal beliefs of its pharmacists.”

Christina Fecher, a spokeswoman for Meijer, told the Tribune that the company “works hard to support all of our pharmacy customers’ needs,” but declined to comment on Peterson’s specific case.

Fecher said that Meijer has a company policiy that acknowledges the rights of pharmacists to abstain from filling a prescription due to religious beliefs. If they do that, however, they must transfer the prescription to another pharmacy or have another Meijer pharmacist fill it. Peterson in her claim said that the pharmacist who refused to fill her prescription did not do either of those two things.

Meijer is headquartered in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and has 242 stores throughout the Midwest.

Leo Vidal

I am a lifelong Democrat with a passion for social justice and progressive issues. I have degrees in writing, economics and law from the University of Iowa.