Rape Victim Denied Morning After Pill by Hospital (Must Drive to Next Co.)

[JPZenger]

http://www.pennlive.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/news/115383211470590.xml&coll=1

"Rape victim denied morning-after pill
July 25, 2006, Harrisburg PA The Patriot-News

"Lebanon PA - A Good Samaritan Hospital emergency room doctor refused to give a rape victim a morning-after pill because he said it was against his Mennonite religion. Rebuffed by the doctor, the woman called her gynecologist, who wrote the prescription. Her local pharmacy told her it was out of the drug and referred her to a sister store in Reading (Note - that is about a 30 minute drive, in the next county). The (doctor) ... said he sees nothing strange about asking a woman from eastern Lebanon County to drive to Reading for a drug. "People drive to Reading to buy jeans. Even if that were the case, that you had to drive to Reading to get this , to me that does not rise to a compulsion that you have to pass laws that have to do something," Dr. Joe Kearns said.

...The state backs up his refusal. Hospitals are not required to prescribe emergency contraception pills, and the state does not keep statistics on how many do, said Richard McGarvey, spokesman for the state Health Department. "There is a law that says if a hospital chooses not to provide a treatment for religious reasons, they can do that," McGarvey said.

...Jenny Murphy-Shifflet, executive director of the Sexual Assault Resource and Counseling Center of Lebanon County, has her focus on the victims. She said she has been trying for a year to get Good Samaritan Hospital to require its doctors to write prescriptions for emergency contraceptives. "No victim should have to run around town after an assault looking for emergency contraceptives," she said." ...The woman who reported the rape was emotionally unable to speak to a reporter yesterday, her father said."