[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 113 (Tuesday, July 26, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1411]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            INTRODUCTION OF THE ACCESS TO BIRTH CONTROL ACT

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. CAROLYN B. MALONEY

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, July 26, 2011

  Mrs. MALONEY. Mr. Speaker, today I am reintroducing the Access to 
Birth Control, ABC, Act in the House with Senator Frank Lautenberg 
leading the effort in the Senate.
  Ninety-eight percent of American women use birth control over the 
course of their lifetime. This bill ensures that any woman who would 
like birth control and who has a legal prescription or is seeking over-
the-counter emergency contraception, will be able to get it in a timely 
and convenient manner.
  The ABC Act would make it illegal for a pharmacist to refuse to 
return a birth control prescription or for a pharmacist to intimidate, 
threaten or harass customers or intentionally breach or threaten to 
breach medical confidentiality.
  By placing the burden of responsibility on the pharmacy, the ABC Act 
strikes a balance between the rights of individual pharmacists based on 
their beliefs and the right of women to receive medication. If the 
request product is not in stock, but the pharmacy stocks other forms of 
contraception, the bill mandates that the pharmacy help the woman 
obtain the medication without delay by the method of her preference 
(order, referral or a transferred prescription).
  Very simply, this legislation ensures a woman's legal access to birth 
control.
  Over the past several years, there have been reports of pharmacists 
refusing to fill prescriptions for birth control pills.
  There have been reports in at least twenty-four states across the 
nation including: Arizona, Massachusetts, Washington and Missouri. 
These refusals are based on personal or religious beliefs, not on 
legitimate medical or professional concerns related to quality of 
patient care. In some cases, pharmacist have kept and refused to 
transfer a prescription, refused to sell over-the-counter emergency 
contraception, or given the customer false medical information about 
the requested birth control. Pharmacists have taken it upon themselves 
to decide whose prescription they will fill and which over-the-counter 
medication they will provide.
  This bill is particularly timely as just last week, the Institute of 
Medicine, IOM, recommended that family-planning services, including the 
full range of FDA-approved contraceptive methods, be recognized as a 
preventive-health service that must be covered by insurance plans 
without additional costs.
  This recommendation from the IOM marks an important first step toward 
near-universal contraceptive coverage in America, but if women are 
denied the actual contraceptives when they go to their pharmacist, 
having no-cost contraceptives is rendered meaningless. We must ensure 
that American women do not face obstacles when seeking doctor 
prescribed, legal medications.
  The Access to Birth Control Act, ABC ACT, is an important step in 
protecting a woman's right to contraception. Birth control and 
emergency contraception are part of a women's basic health care and 
pharmacists should not have the right to interfere.

                          ____________________