In Washington State, a 2007 regulation prohibits pharmacies from refusing to dispense lawful prescriptions. In response to a lawsuit challenging the rule's failure to offer an exemption on religious grounds for drugs like Plan B, or emergency, contraception, a trial court judge issued a temporary injunction preventing the state from enforcing it. But yesterday the 9th Circuit reversed that decision, removing the injunction and allowing the state's licensing board to enforce the requirement.
While the religious objections of individual pharmacists may still be accommodated, a pharmacy may not refuse service, a distinction, the ruling noted, that the district court failed to give enough consideration. The LATimes has more :
The 9th Circuit ruling, however, means that the requirement that pharmacies stock and dispense Plan B takes immediate effect, said Joyce Roper, an assistant attorney general for Washington state.
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Although the courts have yet to pronounce judgment on other aspects of the pharmacists' lawsuit, the unanimous ruling on the Free Exercise Clause could portend concurring judgments as the case moves forward that a patient's right to timely medication supersedes an individual pharmacist's personal convictions.
Via How Appealing, you can read the unanimous decision, written by Judge Kim Wardlaw, here (pdf). An excerpt below:
That the rules may affect pharmacists who object to Plan B for religious reasons does not undermine the neutrality of the rules. The Free Exercise Clause is not violated even though a group motivated by religious reasons may be more likely to engage in the proscribed conduct. . . . Thus, the district court erred in finding that “the object of the regulations is to eliminate from the practice of pharmacy. . . those pharmacists who, for religious reasons, object to the delivery of lawful medications, specifically Plan B.” The neutrality of the new rules is not destroyed by the possibility that, disproportionately, it is pharmacists with religious objections to Plan B who will require accommodation under the rules.
