Letters Of The Day

notice that all 3 deal with a woman's issue, and all 3 were written by men.

U.S. Rep. Steve King believes forcing pharmacists and doctors to perform acts that are "contrary to their beliefs is immoral" (Aug. 24 letter).

Following his logic, tax preparers should be allowed to not deduct clients' charitable contributions to charities that perform services contrary to their beliefs. Taxpayers should be allowed to not pay the portion of their taxes supporting government operations that are contrary to their beliefs. Lawyers opposed to ending life support can refuse to write living wills, and doctors will not be required to follow such medical directives of their patients.

The list is endless.

-Charles R. Card, Urbandale.

and

Dispensing birth control is not the same thing as forcing a doctor to perform an abortion. The so-called morning-after pill is a 72-hour contraceptive device meant to prevent pregnancy, not to "end a life that began the night before."

Pharmacists should not be able to discriminate. If anyone arrives at the pharmacy with a legally obtained prescription, whether it is for contraception, depression or erectile dysfunction, it should be filled without the pharmacist's personal morality butting in. Any other way sets a dangerous precedent.

In U.S. Rep. Steve King's world, I guess "freedom of choice" means that emergency medical personnel don't have to provide treatment to members of certain races, because of their faith. A restaurant should be protected from having to serve Jews. A policeman should not be forced to protect someone who he thinks looks gay. The shopkeeper can refuse to sell you those potato chips because his conscience tells him you are too fat.

-Mike Burgher, Urbandale.

and

According to his Web site, U.S. Rep. Steve King has an impressive background in agribusiness. He boasts about "28 years of business know-how," but I have been unable to find any reference to his medical credentials.

King, and apparently some pharmacists, feel more qualified than a doctor to make private health-care decisions that should be left to a woman and her physician. A medical decision made between a doctor and a patient should not be second-guessed by King or any pharmacist.

King compares a doctor refusing to perform an abortion to a pharmacist refusing to fill a prescription. The two are hardly comparable. We would not ask a podiatrist to perform abortions, just as we would not ask that same doctor for soil-conservation advice. Both are equally out of the foot doctor's area of expertise. But the basic tenet of a pharmacist's job is to dispense medications that have been legally prescribed by a knowledgeable physician, not make moral judgments about what the patient should be doing.

-Dennis R. Carney, Des Moines.

--source