Michigan woman says pharmacist refused to fill her miscarriage medication prescription due to religious beliefs

A woman in Michigan claims that a pharmacist at a Meijer location refused to fill her miscarriage medication, citing his religious views.

“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,” Rachel Peterson told The Chicago Tribune. “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.

{mosads}The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Michigan wrote to Meijer this week warning the grocery store and pharmacy chain that the pharmacist’s action in July was discriminatory and violated Michigan’s public accommodations laws.

Merissa Kovach, a Michigan ACLU policy strategist, said in a statement 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 said.

“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,” she told the Tribune.

The ACLU is asking Meijer to implement a policy to 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 case specifically.

She added that Meijer recognizes the rights of pharmacists to abstain from filling a prescription, but that they are required to transfer the prescription to another pharmacy or have another Meijer pharmacist fill it. Peterson says that her pharmacist did not do either.

Peterson eventually called a different Meijer location 3 1/2 hours away, where a pharmacist filled the prescription.