Protection of Conscience Project
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HB 68

Testimony of
Karen Brauer

Testimony of Robert Garbe, R.Ph.

Chairman White and members of the House Health Committee, thank you for allowing me to testify today on House Bill 68, the Pharmacists Conscience Clause legislation.  My name is Robert Garbe, and I am a pharmacist with 43 years experience in the practice of pharmacy.  My professional background includes: patent holder of a unit dose medication delivery system, owner of an independent pharmacy, supervisor in a manufacturing pharmacy, and for the last ten years community pharmacy practice for a large retail chain.  I hope to continue working for many more years.

 I support H.B. 68, sponsored by Representative Keith Faber, because I will most likely lose my job if I follow my conscience and not fill a prescription that will kill a baby.  There is an unwritten rule that if I do not satisfy the customer’s legal requests I will place my employment in serious jeopardy.  I have never before been in the position of this moral dilemma in the years of my pharmacy practice.

This is important to pharmacists because we spend a considerable portion of our work day evaluating, advising and subsequently preventing harmful medication from reaching pregnant or potentially pregnant women.   We are consistently being questioned by customers concerning safety for the baby when using over the counter medication to treat the mother's illness.

My personal belief (as is the belief of many of my colleagues) is that killing of the innocent life in the womb is every bit as heinous as the killing of the "Undesirables" by Nazis in the 1940's Germany and Poland.  To require and intimidate me with regulations that will terminate my livelihood if I "do not go along" is as reprehensible as it must have been to the guards who ushered the Innocent into the gas chambers.    Excuses like "It is just my job" cannot be good enough to participate in this killing of life.  Please prevent this dilemma that many pharmacist like myself face.  In these hearings considerable testimony has been given to advocate for the woman.  Who, if not the pharmacist, will speak for the baby in the womb?

Thank you very much:  I hope that you will favorably report H.B. 68 from this committee.  I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Kmart pharmacist
fired
 

Testimony of Karen Brauer, M.S., RPh

House Bill 68 addresses the need for protecting a pharmacist's right to choose to dispense only those drugs which promote life and health of a patient.  There is a long medical tradition admonishing the health care professional to do no harm.  This tradition codified most clearly in the Hippocratic Oath has unfortunately been set aside by many.  Others of us wish to adhere to a practice of preserving and promoting human life. 

A pharmacist, whether as employee or business owner, bears individual clinical, legal, and moral responsibility for his or her dispensing decisions.  Authority to make the decisions needs to be protected.  Without this authority, the practice of pharmacy is untenable.  

While it has proven possible to bring a legal defense of the pharmacist's right to avoid killing humans, in the state of Ohio, it is quite difficult.  After being fired from K-Mart pharmacy in 1996, for refusal to dispense an abortifacient birth control drug, I won the opportunity to present my case in federal court.   This procedure required the benevolent assistance of the American Center for Law and Justice, a public interest law firm.  It should be mentioned that no local lawyers felt that I had a case with a chance of success in the state of Ohio.  The usual pharmacist, after losing a job, does not have the funding to initiate a legal battle which may extend for so many years as mine has taken.  Also the usual pharmacist might not be able to spend years of effort, publicizing an issue on the internet until it attracts the interest of the news media and the general public.  It should not be necessary, nor is it desirable, to assist in bringing about the bankruptcy of a large corporation with so many employees, in order to draw attention to an abrogation of those human rights which were traditionally respected in the United States.

A clearly written law, protecting the dispensing authority of pharmacists who choose not to kill will serve the needs of women who deserve to be fully informed concerning their means of birth control.  In a state in which medical professionals are not expected to end human life, women will understand that there is also not an expectation for them to do the same.  There will be incentive and opportunity to directly address the problems of rape and sexual abuse, rather than to conceal them by the various means of abortion.  A clearly written law will help to define the relationship of health care professionals and their employers.  An employer may continue to expect that an employee pharmacist should bring profitability to the company, but not that he or she kill in order to do so. 

The prospect of being forced to participate in ending human life serves as a deterrent for many capable people who would otherwise be attracted to the health professions.  A perceived shortage of providers of chemical and surgical abortion is driving such organizations as NARAL and Planned Parenthood to coerce participation by the unwilling. These organizations also seek to protect their income stream by denying or obfuscating the information about the birth control in question, which is found in the physician package inserts of the drugs, and in the medical literature.   

At issue today are the rights of patients and medical professionals who wish to avoid ending human life at any stage of development.  Patients deserve information and care from health care providers who are free to avoid killing in their practice.   This pharmacist is grateful to Representative Keith Faber for introducing House bill 68, and urges the support of this legislation by the Health Care Committee.   

For your convenience and for paperwork reduction, pertinent review articles from Archives of Family Medicine and The Annals of Pharmacotherapeutics are linked at this internet location: http://forums.delphiforums.com/pharmacistsrant/messages?msg=986.1