Bad Target. No!

Target is normally one of my favorite retailers - good merchandise, easy on the wallet, and generally laudable corporate practices. Which is why it sucks so much when they mess up. Yep, Target pharmacy is the latest to jump on the refusal bandwagon, this time in Missouri. Planned Parenthood (via Pam) reports:

A 26-year-old Missouri woman was refused EC when she handed her prescription to a pharmacist at a Target store in Fenton, MO, on September 30. The woman was told by the pharmacist, “I won’t fill it. It’s my right not to fill it.” She was told that she could go to a local Walgreens instead. The woman said, “When the pharmacist told me she wouldn't [fill the prescription], I went from disbelief to shock to anger. I guess I'm still pretty angry. It seems unbelievable to me that a medical professional could/would deny access to a federally approved drug and impose their personal beliefs in a professional setting. I am also grateful that I did not need it filled at that time. I don't know how it would be if I had just been raped or if the condom broke and I was a feeling confusion and panic anyway -- and then was denied access and told to go across the street.”

The national headquarters of Target has not responded to three PPFA attempts to clarify its policy on pharmacist refusals.

Now, this may be more about Missouri than about Target, but that doesn't excuse their apparent unwillingness to take a corporate position against this kind of bullshit. With the recent launch of their new line of prescription bottles and pharmacy services, filling prescriptions is big business for Target - they need to make sure that the public can trust that they won't have to submit to political/partisan grandstanding when they go to get their pills. Planned Parenthood offers an easy-to-submit online letter demanding that Target and other major companies clarify their corporate policy on dispensing birth control and emergency contraception. You know what to do!