Order Regarding "Morning-After" Pill Roils Bishops

MADRID, Spain, MAY 20, 2001 (Zenit.org).- Bishops in southern Spain criticized an order by an Andalucia official requiring pharmacies to stock the potentially abortive “morning-after” pill.

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Such an order is unjust and “an offense against pharmacists´ [right to] conscientious objection,” said Bishop Antonio Dorado Soto of Málaga-Melilla.

The pill also sidesteps the legal requirements established in Spain for a woman to have an abortion, bishops contended.

Bishop Soto was reacting to an order Saturday by Francisco Vallejo, the Andalucian health counselor, who announced that pharmacies would be required to stock the morning-after pill beginning this week and that pharmacists could not plead conscientious objection.

Archbishop Carlos Amigo Vallejo of Seville said, “We are following lines that are somewhat anti-social,” given the aging of Spain´s population. There is urgent need “to declare man an especially protected species,” he added.

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