NARAL calls for Ohio pharmacists to broaden availability of, education about Plan B

CLEVELAND NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio last week released a survey of Ohio pharmacies regarding the general availability of the emergency contraceptive Plan B to women over the age of 18, finding that less than 5 percent of those pharmacies surveyed refused to fill the request of a Plan B purchase “because someone on staff had objections to the medication,” but that as many as 30 percent of pharmacies surveyed either did not carry Plan B or were out of stock at the time of the survey.

Further, only 8 percent of respondents could correctly identify the three possible ways that Plan B works to prevent pregnancy, though it was unclear whether those respondents were all pharmacists. “[One-quarter] of pharmacists or pharmacy employees stated that [Plan B] is the same as the ‘abortion pill,’” NARAL reported.

Pharmacy investigators conducted phone surveys across 216 pharmacies and “secret shopper” surveys of 107 randomly selected pharmacies throughout Ohio between Nov. 1, 2007 and Jan. 31, 2008. The phone surveys were conducted by an individual caller, and the “secret shopper” surveys were conducted by teams of two female investigators.

Following release of the survey, NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio Foundation called on more Ohio pharmacies stock the medication; suggested that both pharmacists and pharmacy staff members need more education into the mechanism of action of Plan B; and recommended Ohio consider changing its Medicaid policies so that women covered by Medicaid can get coverage for Plan B as an OTC medicine considering the average retail of Plan B was $43 according to the survey.