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They Think It's Murder

richarddawkins.com

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Re: They Think It's Murder

#161

Post by Calavar »

areyousure wrote: post #146
Calavar wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They were talking about being scrutinized as a criminal. You seem to be talking about being tried as a criminal under the law, which is a very different thing. People with miscarriages are already scrutinized as potential criminals. Some examples: * Several pharmacies in Texas refused to fill misoprostol prescriptions because they weren't sure whethet it was being prescribed for a legal abortion or an illegal one. Yo…

In case anyone is curious, pharmacies routinely refuse to fill opiate prescriptions: https://www.practicalpainmanagement.com/resources/ethics/whe... Walmart is proud that their pharmacists refuse to fill prescriptions: https://corporate.walmart.com/newsroom/2020/12/22/a-misguide... > Walmart has blocked thousands of questionable doctors from having their opioid prescriptions filled by any of our pharmacists

I am well aware that pharmacists can and do refuse to fill opioid prescriptions. The difference is that they refuse to fill opioid prescriptions based on fill patterns that are suspicious for criminal activity: If one person came in with an oxycodone prescription from Dr. A last month and Dr. B last week and from Dr. C today, that triggers some alarm bells and the pharmacist may refuse to fill the prescription. If Dr. A is writing 10x more opioid prescriptions than any other physician, that may also raise suspicion.

What a pharmacist does NOT do is refuse to fill an opioid because they think the prescriber or the patient is being dishonest about the prescribing reason even though they don't have any specific evidence to support that. What a pharmacist does NOT do is refuse to fill an opioid because in their opinion it is unethical to take opioids for any reason, even reasons that are considered medical standard of care. But that is exactly what happens with misoprostol.

Some examples:

Refusing to prescribe due to ethical beliefs:

> A Walgreens pharmacist refused to provide an Arizona woman with miscarriage medication, citing his ethical beliefs.... Several days before going to Walgreens to pick up the medicine, Arteaga’s doctor told her that there was no fetal heartbeat and she would have a miscarriage.... Walgreens said in a statement that the company had contacted Arteaga and apologized for the handling of the situation. However, the pharmacy chain noted that the pharmacist had not violated its policy with his refusal.

Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/25/walgreens-pharmacist-refused...

Side note - This is a miscarriage. What ethical beliefs apply when the fetus is already dead?

Refusing to prescribe due to not believing the patient and/or prescriber:

> A Michigan woman says a pharmacist for a regional supermarket chain denied her medication prescribed to treat her miscarriage because it was against his religious beliefs.... He could not “in good conscience fill the prescription” because he thought she wanted to use it to end her pregnancy, the letter states.... Peterson explained to Kalkman that her doctor said the fetus was not viable, but he responded “that was just [her] word," the letter says.

Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/meijer-pharmacist-denie...

Refusing to prescribe with no explanation at all, even when the indication is universally uncontroversial:

> One Austin pharmacy chain sent a letter to doctors in December saying it would no longer provide methotrexate, even for ectopic pregnancies.... “I have interviewed 20 practicing OB-GYNs, and almost all of them have said they had a patient who could not get a prescription filled at a pharmacy when they had an ectopic pregnancy,” said Dr. Charles Brown, the Texas representative on the board of directors for the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

Source: https://archive.ph/UWtgu

Re: They Think It's Murder

#162

Post by maratc »

manicdee wrote: post #152
maratc wrote: post #7

Not only "They" think it's murder, we as a society tend to think it's murder too. Here's my argument: in most jurisdictions, a killing of a pregnant woman brings harsher sentence than a killing of non-pregnant woman. In some, it just doubles the crime (double homicide, double manslaughter, etc.) Judging from this, we as a society see at least some value in the life of a foetus. The issue is a complicated one. We seem…

We as a society see some value in the success of a wanted pregnancy. Once you consider the intentions of the pregnant person, it’s easier to resolve these “competing rights”. When you only consider a woman to be an incubator for your children (and not an actual person in their own right), yes the issue can appear murky and confusing.

> Once you consider the intentions of the pregnant person

So a homicide of a pregnant woman that has an unwanted pregnancy should be single homicide, not double homicide?

> When you only consider a woman to be an incubator for your children (and not an actual person in their own right)

Implying inferior motives for the opposing side makes it easy to dismiss their argument. But this is not about women being "an incubator for your children" — this is about fetuses being "an actual person in their own right".

Re: They Think It's Murder

#163

Post by maratc »

lamontcg wrote: post #147
maratc wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm going to wade in I'm going to roe out then. (I'll see myself out.)

Can we keep the reddit pun threads out of an issue which is going to result in the deaths of thousands of young women?

Humour is a good mechanism of coping with harsh reality that we as individuals have very little influence over. Dramatizing the (already dramatic) situation even more helps no one.

Re: They Think It's Murder

#164

Post by sershe »

kcplate wrote: post #119
gonzo41 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the meantime, whilst there's debate on legislation, women will die from ectopic pregnancies and other women's health issues that require the termination of a non viable pregnancy. It's very grim.

Yes, this is one of the new “talking point” but it literally assumes that entire medical teams are going to sit on their hands all across the country and let women die. Let me make my prediction right now that this will never happen.

This happened to my wife when she was travelling in Utah, she had an ectopic pregnancy at the point where she was already in a decent amount of pain and they wouldn't give her the pill to eliminate it because they wanted to monitor more to see if it's maybe viable/not ectopic. They told her she can try a difference hospital... she flew back to CA the same day and got it taken care of there.

Re: They Think It's Murder

#165

Post by lamontcg »

maratc wrote: post #163
lamontcg wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can we keep the reddit pun threads out of an issue which is going to result in the deaths of thousands of young women?

Humour is a good mechanism of coping with harsh reality that we as individuals have very little influence over. Dramatizing the (already dramatic) situation even more helps no one.

I'm a big fan of gallows humor. Lazy pun threads aren't that.

Re: They Think It's Murder

#166

Post by jwie »

alexvoda wrote: post #127
jwie wrote: post #48

Dawkins is not a stupid man, yet he does not make arguments that the embryo isn't a human life in all his erudite prose. Who will he convince? Our early-modern ancestors, and even those only a few generations ago were more than aware that most babies did not survive. Whether miscarried, birthed still, or died in infancy. Our ancestors never imagined these things weren't deaths, and that those who cause them intention…

Did people of the time you mention or of the present, consider those who caused the intentional death of their own children through rejection of vaccination to be wicked? I would guess antivaxxers both then and now would consider those deaths to be just deaths or the will of the supernatural or maybe even that it was the children who were wicked.

It's too bad HN shut down the parent article. But you asked a good question about what early modern persons thought about early modern vaccine analogues.

Prior to the smallpox vaccine in the late 18th century, there was a smallpox inoculation. This was a risky, though effective, procedure where a doctor would take pustules from an infected person and give a small amount of the substance to an uninfected person.

Smallpox mortality was about 3/10. I don't know what the pre-vaccine strategy's mortality rate was, but it was probably marginally lower, but still a significant risk. Did it outweigh the risk of smallpox? Should parents have done this to their children? Many did, and a proportionate number of people died. Perhaps they made a good risk/reward calculus, but it was always a risk/reward profile they were analyzing, making a decision based on their situation and the best interest of them or their children.

These days iatrogenic harm from vaccines is low, but it still exists. The VAERS program tracks vaccine adverse effects. Typically vaccine adverse effects are related to tainted batches of vaccine doses. But this is a risk the system, patients, and doctors tolerate as it tends to be outweighed by the rewards.

Medicine and medical interventions today are lower risk than their historical analogues, but no medical intervention, even the occasional ibuprofen or aspirin, is without risk. These risks must be weighed by patient and doctor and ultimatley the patient provides informed consent, or rejects the treatment.

Re: They Think It's Murder

#167

Post by Eddy_Viscosity2 »

Balgair wrote: post #85
maratc wrote: post #7

Not only "They" think it's murder, we as a society tend to think it's murder too. Here's my argument: in most jurisdictions, a killing of a pregnant woman brings harsher sentence than a killing of non-pregnant woman. In some, it just doubles the crime (double homicide, double manslaughter, etc.) Judging from this, we as a society see at least some value in the life of a foetus. The issue is a complicated one. We seem…

I'm going to wade in on this against my better interests. To me, the debate seems to have a paradox that can't be resolved using the logic we've inherited from the Enlightenment (mostly). Namely: People have rights to their bodies. Yes, it's super-duper more complicated than just that, I know. But, to my brain, it seems to boil mostly down to that. We have to define rights, people, bodies, what 'have' means, etc. Sur…

Lots of examples in nature where mothers kill their newborns (and sometimes eat them). They do this for a variety of reasons. Nature does care about making babies, but it also gives a fair bit of leeway to moms.

Re: They Think It's Murder

#169

Post by mbg721 »

Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote: post #168

I think there might be a loophole. If a pregnant woman becomes a police officer before getting an abortion, she then just has to say the fetus was threatening and then she'll get some paid time off to recover.

The pro-life sarcastic riff on this would be that if only most aborted babies were black, the law would enthusiastically permit their deaths. Oh, wait...
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