EALING: Woman refused contraception twice by Boots (From This Is Local London)

Two Ealing stores refuse musician contraceptive pill on moral grounds

11:39am Thursday 27th November 2008 in News By Alex Hayes

A musician was left feeling “humiliated and disgusted” after being refused the morning after pill twice.

Tiffany Berton, a 28-year-old singer songwriter went to two different Boots stores in Ealing to get the pill as a extra precaution.

But both times she was refused the contraceptive, which costs £25 to buy over the counter, on moral and religious grounds.

She said: “I went to the Boots store next to Ealing Broadway station, but was told they did not stock it on religious grounds and was sent to the other Boots shop in Ealing Broadway.

“When I got there I was made to fill out a form, then the assistant showed it to the pharmacist, before coming back and telling me I could not have the pill.

“It made me feel like I was being judged and branded an amoral woman, even though I was being responsible.

Miss Berton, who lives in South Ealing Road, continued: “I was furious, but also humiliated and disgusted.

“I'm on low income and on housing benefits, and now is not the right time for me to bring a child into the world.

“Yet the way these people were acting it was as if they were saying your either single and celibate or married.”

She said she now intends to mount a campaign to stop pharmacists being able to refuse treatments on religious and moral grounds.

She said: “Where does it stop? Refusing to give HIV treatment to a gay person?

“What happens if a vulnerable and scared teenager who has made a mistake goes to these people and gets the same reaction? How would she feel?”

Helen Watkinson, a spokesman for Boots, said it was legel for pharmacists to refuse treatments on religious or moral grounds.

She said: “In this case the Royal Pharmaceutical Society code of ethics states a pharmacist should ensure they direct the patient to another pharmacist for an alternative supply if appropriate.

“We are sorry that in this instance the customer was not satisfactorily directed to an alternative source, and we will be reviewing the process with the stores involved.”