View Full Forums : Pope Urges Pharmacists to Refuse "Immoral" Prescriptions


Tudamorf
10-29-2007, 03:46 PM
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071029/ap_on_he_me/pope_prescriptions_4<b>Pope to druggists: Shun 'immoral' scrips</b>

VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI urged Catholic pharmacists on Monday to use conscientious objection to avoid dispensing drugs with "immoral purposes such as, for example, abortion or euthanasia."

In a speech to participants at the 25th International Congress of Catholic Pharmacists, Benedict said that conscientious objection was a right that must be recognized by the pharmaceutical profession. Such objector status, he said, would "enable them not to collaborate directly or indirectly in supplying products that have clearly immoral purposes such as, for example, abortion or euthanasia."

In his speech, the pope also said that pharmacists have an educational role toward patients so that drugs are used in a morally and ethically correct way. "We cannot anesthetize consciences as regards, for example, the effect of certain molecules that have the goal of preventing the implantation of the embryo or shortening a person's life," he said.

Emergency contraception pills, which can be taken up to 72 hours after unprotected sex, work by preventing ovulation or by preventing the embryo from being implanted into the womb.

The pope said pharmacists should raise people's awareness so that "all human beings are protected from conception to natural death, and so that medicines truly play a therapeutic role."

The issue has been debated extensively in the United States.

Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich introduced the rule more than two years ago requiring pharmacists to fill all prescriptions. Pharmacists challenged the rule, and a legal settlement earlier this month allowed pharmacists who object to dispensing emergency birth control to step aside while someone else fills the prescription.

In Washington state, pharmacists have filed a federal lawsuit over a regulation requiring them to sell emergency contraception, saying it violates their civil rights by forcing them into choosing between "their livelihoods and their deeply held religious and moral beliefs."

A few states in the U.S. have passed laws that specifically allow pharmacists or pharmacies to refuse to provide health care due to religious or moral objections, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive rights think tank based in New York.

Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi and South Dakota have legislation that explicitly permits pharmacists to refuse to dispense contraceptives, according to the Institute, and Florida, Illinois, Maine and Tennessee have broadly worded legislation that may apply to pharmacists.

In California, on the other hand, pharmacists are required to fill all valid prescriptions and can only refuse with employer approval and if the customer can still access the prescription in a timely manner.

In Britain, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society has a code of ethics allowing pharmacists who have religious objections to refuse dispensing certain drugs, such as emergency contraception. But their objection must be stated to their employer before they start working, and they must refer patients to other pharmacists who can provide the requested drugs.Ridiculous. If your god(s) don't allow you to do the job of a pharmacist, don't be one. It's hard enough for a scared teenager to get Plan B or for a terminally ill patient to end his suffering; the last thing they need is some self-righteous zealot forcing them to suffer further.

What's even sadder is that a number of religious zealot controlled hick states actually condone this practice.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-29-2007, 05:02 PM
Any pharmacist who refuses to fill a scrip should be stripped of his or her license, immediately.

Not filling a patient's legitimate scrip is not only against the pharmacist code, it is unethical.

Tudamorf
10-29-2007, 05:51 PM
Not filling a patient's legitimate scrip is not only against the pharmacist code, it is unethical.Apparently in the bible belt states, it isn't.

Stormhaven
10-29-2007, 05:52 PM
Viagra is ok though?

Tudamorf
10-29-2007, 05:56 PM
Viagra is ok though?I'm betting no, if you're gay.

Anka
10-29-2007, 06:33 PM
Ridiculous. If your god(s) don't allow you to do the job of a pharmacist, don't be one. It's hard enough for a scared teenager to get Plan B or for a terminally ill patient to end his suffering; the last thing they need is some self-righteous zealot forcing them to suffer further.

Aren't you the same person who strongly supports the rights of anaethetists who refuse to sedate a prisoner for execution, even if it may lead to a painful death?

Tudamorf
10-29-2007, 07:03 PM
Aren't you the same person who strongly supports the rights of anaethetists who refuse to sedate a prisoner for execution, even if it may lead to a painful death?Not exactly. But the two situations aren't at all comparable.

Medical ethics, not mythological texts, prohibit doctors from doing harm to a patient against his will. It's part of the job description.

However, pushing the Christian agenda to make people suffer is not part of a pharmacist's job description or ethical code.

Anka
10-29-2007, 08:53 PM
Medical ethics, not mythological texts, prohibit doctors from doing harm to a patient against his will. It's part of the job description.

However, pushing the Christian agenda to make people suffer is not part of a pharmacist's job description or ethical code.

You'd like the situations to be incompatible but the dividing line is very thin really. There is no moral reason why one drug dispenser (a pharmacist) is absolved of ethical principles whilst another (an anaesthetist) is absolutely bound by ethics. If you want 'abortion pills' to be sold by anyone to anyone then change the law and put them into vending machines, don't blame the pharmacists.

Perhaps you could also consider that some doctors are willing to perform abortions when other consider it the taking of life. Somehow the medical profession has found a middle ground between forcing all qualified doctors to condone abortions and expelling all abortionists. Pharmactists can find a compromise too over abortion pills.

Tudamorf
10-29-2007, 09:40 PM
You'd like the situations to be incompatible but the dividing line is very thin really. There is no moral reason why one drug dispenser (a pharmacist) is absolved of ethical principles whilst another (an anaesthetist) is absolutely bound by ethics.They're opposite situations. The anesthesiologist is following his ethical code and job description by refusing to anesthetize condemned prisoners, whereas the pharmacist isn't by refusing to fill prescriptions.

It's not as though the anesthesiologist has some religious exemption which allows him to say, "well I'm a Christian and therefore I like seeing people suffer, therefore I will ignore the law and help kill the guy." If you want 'abortion pills' to be sold by anyone to anyone then change the law and put them into vending machines, don't blame the pharmacists.I want the pharmacists to do their job, which is to look at a piece of paper signed by a doctor, take the drug off the shelf, put it in a little bag and sell it to me.

Had I wanted a preacher to tell me I'm an evil sinner who will burn in hell for using Plan B or dying with dignity, I would've gone to one.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 02:17 AM
Pharmactists can find a compromise too over abortion pills.

The compromise should be, if they have a problem filling my, or anyone else's, scrip, they should get into another line of work.

Pharmacists don't only(have to) work behind the counter at Walgreens.

They can work for pharmaceutical companies if they like. They can teach if they like. They can work inhouse pharmacy at Catholic hospitals(where the docs don't write the so called controversial scrips in the first place). They can do research. They are PhD's they can do many many other things than be in the position to NOT fill Plan B scrips.

If they work in a public accessible pharmacy, and refuse to fill a legitimate scrip, they should lose their license. That should be the compromise.

Pharmacists have a lock on dispensing chemicals(drugs) to the rest of us. They have no right to be cowboys, and chose which drugs WE need, or don't need, or which drugs we can get, and those we can't get.

Some shaman witchdoctor in Italy should not be allowed to make medical, scientific, or ethical edicts for the rest of us. This, and the feeding tube edict, tell us that hospitals should start to systematically cut any reference to this zealot. Catholics have enough hospitals, they don't need to be spreading their lies and death cult **** to the others.

Anka
10-30-2007, 07:18 AM
They're opposite situations. The anesthesiologist is following his ethical code and job description by refusing to anesthetize condemned prisoners, whereas the pharmacist isn't by refusing to fill prescriptions.

An ethical code is more than a job description or union rule. It has to exist in a wider context and be consistent within that wider context. Can't you see it is inconsistent for some doctors to absolutely refuse to prescribe an abortion pill yet pharmacists are compelled to provide it, no matter which individuals morally consider themselves assisting in murder?

B_Delacroix
10-30-2007, 08:00 AM
If you can't do the job for whatever reason, find another line of work. This would be like me deciding I can't ethically stand people shooting at target drones so I refuse to fly them. What do you think would happen if I did that? Yea, I'd be flipping burgers at Micky Dees.

Secondly, while I understand a lot of people respect the Pope. He didn't go to medical school. The church has been wrong about a great many things and has a long history of living in the past. It has a history of deciding what people can and cannot handle as in the example of the world not being the center of the universe even if given evidence to the fact. The answer was that "yea, we know, but people can't handle that."

I give you Galileo - "I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use."

Now as to the Bible Belt. The Bible Belt is predominantly protestant. They don't put much into what The Pope says.

This is like those people who joined the army then decided they didn't want to fight. Then don't join the friggen army.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 08:31 AM
An ethical code is more than a job description or union rule. It has to exist in a wider context and be consistent within that wider context. Can't you see it is inconsistent for some doctors to absolutely refuse to prescribe an abortion pill yet pharmacists are compelled to provide it, no matter which individuals morally consider themselves assisting in murder?

Your comparison shows an enormous lack of understanding of the medical profession and the pharmacy profession.

Since you wish to compare anesthesiologists and anesthetists. Then the rightful comparison would be if they did not do their job. Has nothing to do with the death penalty.

A pharmacist not filling a legitimate scrip is NOT doing their job.
An anesthesiologist not doing his job would be him not giving you enough pain meds, such that you felt pain during a surgical procedure(and doing so intentionally). That is what a pharmacist not filling a scrip is akin to...an anesthesiologist intentionally making you feel pain because that is what his religion requires.

It is NOT at all like the death penalty...talk about a stretch. It is not even an analogy(even a poor one) to even attack it for making a poor analogy. It is not even close to even being close to being in the same realm as each other.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 08:53 AM
And for the record, MOST docs will not write you a scrip for Plan B or birth control pills. Dermatologists won't, cardiologists, othopedics, pulmonologists, ent s won't, surgeons won't, pediatricians won't, etc etc etc, even your anesthesiologists won't prescribe you Plan B or the abortion pill.

They are specialized to the extent that if you want to get an abortion or get an abortion pill, you go to the doc who does that, who specializes in that.

Pharmacists don't specialize like that. There are not heart med pharmacists, or joint med pharmacists, or pain med pharmacists. They have ALL the pills on the shelf, they sell, and can sell, all of those pills. And if they don't stock them, they can order them. The same pharmacist routinely can dispense Levitra, levaquin, and lipitor to the same person. And if need be L-dopa.

Well, they do, kinda sorta, up there like I mentioned. They go into, and may go into other lines of pharmacy work, other than dispensing meds to the general public. While this may be the most popular form of pharmacy, it certainly is not the only form. Your Walgreens, CVS, Rite Aid type of pharmacist does not specialize in particular drugs to the exclusion of other classes of drugs.

The legal lock of the profession, their position because of that, the fact that they are licensed by the State, and the DEA, means that they have an obligation to the public, even beyond their oath. They have a duty higher than themselves and their own personal interests. That comes with their profession.

I can't just walk by some person on the street in cardiac arrest without helping, by way of a duty I took on when I joined my profession. There is a higher duty in the medical professions, even if it means doing what you don't want to do. If my ex-wife were choking on a piece of KFC, I certainly would love to see her die on it; but ethically, professionally, I have a duty to save her life(sucks to be me).

And certain laws affecting the whole healthcare industry may violate individual practitioners personal ethics, yet they must still abide by them. HIPAA is one example. It's privacy portion was exclusively and intentionally written to help spread AIDs, yet we must all follow that law. Even if it violates our own personal ethics and values code. No excuses. Only hope is to overturn it eventually, as well as EMTALA(they can both be argued effectively as being unConstitutional).

The difference is the pharmacists you are defending are not dispensing a prescription a person needs. Ethically(and hopefully legally), if they they are failing to dispense medications a person needs, they need to lose their license. What that is akin to, is a nurse intentionally letting a person choke on a piece of chicken or an anesthesiologist not giving enough morphine intentionally.

LauranCoromell
10-30-2007, 01:14 PM
Are other people that work behind the counter allowed to fill a prescription? Does it only take a pharmacists being there to supervise or do they actually have to fill the prescription? I can't imagine many companies wanting to commit to having two pharmacists on the job at all times to cover this eventuality or wanting their customers to be told to go down the street with their business. At least they are required to state their objection up front before taking the job.

Palarran
10-30-2007, 02:38 PM
HIPAA is one example. It's privacy portion was exclusively and intentionally written to help spread AIDs, yet we must all follow that law.
Whoa, wait a second. Exclusively and intentionally written to help spread AIDS?!
You don't actually believe that, do you? Or was that a test just to see if we read your entire post? :P

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 03:09 PM
An ethical code is more than a job description or union rule. It has to exist in a wider context and be consistent within that wider context.Perhaps I was being unclear.

An anesthesiologist takes an oath to do no harm when he signs up, and that oath, as well as medical ethical codes he is required by law to follow, prohibit him from assisting in executions.

When an anesthesiologist refuses to participate in an execution, he is doing his job, as the law requires. Even if he is a Christian and would actually like to kill people in painful ways, he isn't allowed to. He can't use his god(s) an excuse for not performing his job.

When the pharmacist doesn't dispense prescriptions, he is not doing his job, not following the law. He is breaking the law and using his god(s) as an excuse for not performing his job.

That is why the situations are opposites.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 03:37 PM
HIPAA is one example. It's privacy portion was exclusively and intentionally written to help spread AIDs,Yes, why have medical privacy at all? Think of how useful it would be if all medical records were public so we would know which citizens to marginalize or ostracize. <img src=http://lag9.com/rolleyes.gif>

And you're wrong. Without medical privacy laws, people would simply stop going to doctors for HIV tests or if they had any suspicion they might have it. They'd continue spreading it, and we'd be even worse off because we'd be even more in the dark epidemiologically.

Moreover, fear and mistrust of the medical profession would likely spill over to other unpopular conditions, even ones that can be cured, and we'd have new epidemics on our hands.

Medical privacy does not spread HIV. And even if it did, there are more important liberty issues at stake. If you don't want HIV, there are simple and virtually 100% effective ways you can protect yourself. Don't force the State to deprive liberties and coddle you just because you're too lazy to help yourself.

Tinsi
10-30-2007, 04:24 PM
You'd like the situations to be incompatible but the dividing line is very thin really. There is no moral reason why one drug dispenser (a pharmacist) is absolved of ethical principles whilst another (an anaesthetist) is absolutely bound by ethics.

Occupational ethics and personal ethics aren't two sides of the same coin though.

Stormhaven
10-30-2007, 04:47 PM
A pharmacist at a corporate giant like CVS/Walgreens (or even Wally World now) probably will not have the right to decide where their morale line lays, but there are still a lot of mom & pop pharmacists around and I figure it's completely their personal right to decide whether or not to fill a prescription or even stock a drug.

I was just "poking fun" at viagra because generally viagra is used not for procreation but recreation, and isn't sex for sex's sake considered sinful?

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 05:33 PM
Without medical privacy laws, people would simply stop going to doctors for HIV tests or if they had any suspicion they might have it.
Test for it every time one visits the emergency room, of course. Or when you visit a hospital. It should be a routine test, just like a CBC, CMP, or ABG.

They'd continue spreading it, and we'd be even worse off because we'd be even more in the dark epidemiologically.
That is the same FUD they spread back in the 80s. Never panned out, did it. They told us(lied to us point blank) that education would eradicate the disease. They were wrong(lied) about education, just as they are wrong(lie) about using knowledge to eradicate this disease.

Moreover, fear and mistrust of the medical profession would likely spill over to other unpopular conditions, even ones that can be cured, and we'd have new epidemics on our hands.
People should fear and mistrust it now, for letting the disease continue to spread, when mere isolation would have eradicated HIV 10 years ago. No one would have it today(or rather hardly 30-50K new cases each year), certainly no one would be spreading it.

Medical privacy does not spread HIV.
It allows it to spread. If a wife comes in and gets an HIV test, turns positive, medical care workers can NOT inform the husband(or husband to wife more likely). The law makes it illegal to prevent the spread of the disease.

And even if it did, there are more important liberty issues at stake. If you don't want HIV, there are simple and virtually 100% effective ways you can protect yourself. Don't force the State to deprive liberties and coddle you just because you're too lazy to help yourself.

You do not, nor EVER had the right to spread disease to others. Especially one that is 100% fatal.

You are making those who contract HIV the villains. You are wrong in twisting logic and reason around like that. It is the transmitters who are the villains.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 05:41 PM
When an anesthesiologist refuses to participate in an execution, he is doing his job, as the law requires.

I would not even go that far. It is just not in the scope of practice.

Ostensibly, there could very well be an offshoot of the profession which DOES accept euthanasia or killing people on death row, as within its scope.

That is another reason his comparison does not even become a bad analogy. They don't do it right now anyways.

It is like saying, "Omg the butcher won't bake bread". It is not their job,,,,yet. They don't already do it.

Pharmacists already dispense medications. Not dispensing needed medications is NOT doing their profession, not doing their job, not doing their existing duty.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 05:53 PM
Test for it every time one visits the emergency room, of course. Or when you visit a hospital.If a wife comes in and gets an HIV test, turns positive, medical care workers can NOT inform the husband(or husband to wife more likely). The law makes it illegal to prevent the spread of the disease.And if HIV+ patients know you'll publicly disclose their condition if they visit their hospital, guess what? They won't go there. And they'll keep spreading HIV, as well as other new diseases that might have been prevented had you respected their privacy in the first place.That is the same FUD they spread back in the 80s. Never panned out, did it. They told us(lied to us point blank) that education would eradicate the disease.It's not the same thing at all. I'm saying that eliminating privacy rights will not stop the spread. You're saying that education will stop the spread. Two completely different ideas.People should fear and mistrust it now, for letting the disease continue to spread, when mere isolation would have eradicated HIV 10 years ago.Ridiculous. Isolation would have, at best, slowed it down a little. At a huge cost of liberty.You are making those who contract HIV the villains.Yes, you usually are partly to blame if you get infected.

If you share needles, or have high risk sex without a condom, you know full well the risk you're taking. You can even continue to perform the same activity (drug use, high risk sex) and protect yourself, so you have little excuse.

This is not a disease you can catch by riding the subway home. You have to deliberately and repeatedly engage in a risky course of conduct without protection.

Why should the State make others suffer to help you, when you won't even help yourself?

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 05:58 PM
You do not, nor EVER had the right to spread disease to others.So if you test positive for MRSA, we should execute and cremate you. Because MRSA kills people and there is no practical way to isolate you from the general population.Especially one that is 100% fatal.HIV patients can lead normal lives for decades. Life is also 100% fatal.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 06:20 PM
So if you test positive for MRSA, we should execute and cremate you.
Little over the top reactionary idiocy perhaps. Isolation is isolation, simple. Big jump from isolation to killing people.

Because MRSA kills people and there is no practical way to isolate you from the general population.
MRSA lives on surfaces, fomites, as well as people. 24 hours on a dry surface, upto 14 days on wet surfaces. HIV is person to person direct contact. It is easy to isolate the virus, if you choose to.

If the p0rn industry can do it, the rest of society could as well. Do exactly what the p0rn industry does to isolate the virus, and it will be gone from the US in a matter of a decade or two.

You are telling me that you are smarter than Seymore Butts or Tanya Hyde or Max Hardcore. Hell, Ron Jeremy does not have HIV. They are the HIGHEST risk category imaginable, yet the industry is HIV free. It is safer to fvck a p0rn star who has had sex with thousands of people(even bareback), than it is to fvck a chick from a university, bar, or church social.

HIV patients can lead normal lives for decades. Life is also 100% fatal.

True. But what is your point? HIV carriers still should not be allowed to spread the disease to other victims.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 06:27 PM
Whoa, wait a second. Exclusively and intentionally written to help spread AIDS?!
You don't actually believe that, do you? Or was that a test just to see if we read your entire post? :P

Yes, it was designed to prevent healthcare workers from collecting data and using that data to prevent the spread of HIV.

If you, Palarran, are my patient, and you have HIV. It is illegal for me, as a healthcare professional, to let any of your prospective or past sex partners know that you do. That is what the privacy portion of the law was designed to do.

I am legally bound to let you spread the virus to others. It is legal for you to spread a 100% deadly disease to others. It is illegal for me to prevent that. That is against my personal ethical code, but am bound by my duty and the law.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 06:43 PM
Little over the top reactionary idiocy perhaps. Isolation is isolation, simple. Big jump from isolation to killing people.Unless you can't practically isolate them, the fact that ties together both examples.If the p0rn industry can do it, the rest of society could as well.Of course it works, because the pr0n industry wants to do it. They are also a tiny subset of society that enters a specialized profession where it is in their mutual best interests to test for STDs.

All of society does not want to do it. Expecting the same results in society at large is like expecting a conscripted soldier to be as good in combat as a professional Marine.

But don't worry, you can have your cake and eat it too, because if you're part of the non-pr0n industry subset of society that does want to do it, you can. You can get tested, and have your partner tested, and/or you can use condoms.True. But what is your point?That the fatality rate alone isn't a good enough reason to throw the nation into paranoid, throw-your-rights-down-the-toilet, lockdown mode.HIV carriers still should not be allowed to spread the disease to other victims.How do you plan to accomplish that, without putting them in a concentration camp, confining them to a maximum security prison in solitary confinement, or killing them?

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 06:46 PM
And if HIV+ patients know you'll publicly disclose their condition if they visit their hospital, guess what?
Who said publicly? A dated medical access ID card would suffice.

They won't go there. And they'll keep spreading HIV, as well as other new diseases that might have been prevented had you respected their privacy in the first place.
FUD again.

It's not the same thing at all. I'm saying that eliminating privacy rights will not stop the spread.
The right to privacy is subordinate when it comes to harming others. I have the right to privacy in my own home, but I can't shoot you in the face there.

You're saying that education will stop the spread.
I am saying that it hasn't. It was what the political special interest groups sold to the general populace as the panacea to stop the disease. Proven failure.

Isolation would have, at best, slowed it down a little.
Removing those who have a virus from those who don't always works.

At a huge cost of liberty.
You do not have the liberty to kill another with your dick or pussy.

Yes, you usually are partly to blame if you get infected.
Blame the victim? Short dress she deserved it, huh? Nice reasoning.

If you share needles, or have high risk sex without a condom, you know full well the risk you're taking. You can even continue to perform the same activity (drug use, high risk sex) and protect yourself, so you have little excuse.
Needles should be OTC, for one. Those who have made needles off limits to IV drug users are accomplices to murder. They are complicit, each and every one.

This is not a disease you can catch by riding the subway home. You have to deliberately and repeatedly engage in a risky course of conduct without protection.
It only takes one time.

Why should the State make others suffer to help you, when you won't even help yourself?
You have already shown your disdain for those too stupid to not get the disease; it is their fault you say. They you cry about them suffering.

The suffering will end when they pass.

The whole ordeal would end, when they pass, having not spread the disease to others.

Sounds like you actually want people to get HIV. Sounds like having a continual population of HIV infected in perpetuity is your goal. Transmitting the virus generation after generation.

Palarran
10-30-2007, 06:51 PM
I might buy that it's a _consequence_ of the privacy portion of HIPAA, but you still need to show:
(1) the authors of HIPAA wanted to encourage the spread of AIDS,
(2) the authors of HIPAA included the privacy section specifically for that purpose, and
(3) the authors of HIPAA had no other purpose in mind whatsoever for that section.

Otherwise you can't claim that it was "exclusively and intentionally" written to encourage the spread of AIDS.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 06:54 PM
It is legal for you to spread a 100% deadly disease to others.It is not legal, at least not in California.

California Health & Safety Code section 120291 makes it a felony, punishable up to eight years in prison, to intentionally spread HIV through sex. (Of course you're free to transmit HIV some more once in prison, which goes back to my previous question.)

Health & Safety Code section 1621.5 makes it a felony, punishable by up to six years, to knowingly donate bodily fluids infected with HIV.

Penal Code section 12022.85 mandates a three year sentence enhancement for sex crimes if you know you're HIV positive (even if you didn't intend to transmit HIV).

And generally speaking, Health & Safety Code section 120290 makes it a misdemeanor to willfully expose yourself or a third party if you are carrying any contagious, infectious, or communicable disease. (Yes, you read that right. You're a known criminal, countless times over.)

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 06:55 PM
Unless you can't practically isolate them, the fact that ties together both examples.
Very practical. A dated medical access ID card.

Of course it works, because the pr0n industry wants to do it. They are also a tiny subset of society that enters a specialized profession where it is in their mutual best interests to test for STDs.
You are saying that it is in the best interest of the general population(society) to have HIV carriers randomly sprinkled about, spread the disease.

All of society does not want to do it. Expecting the same results in society at large is like expecting a conscripted soldier to be as good in combat as a professional Marine.
A small subset, a politically active, special interest group does not want it. A powerful demographic. Two actually, if you consider the evangelicals who want the disease to spread because it is God's will and wrath.

But don't worry, you can have your cake and eat it too, because if you're part of the non-pr0n industry subset of society that does want to do it, you can.
DINKs have money, which they use for political purposes.

You can get tested, and have your partner tested, and/or you can use condoms.
Testing should be mandatory. Epidemiologically, individuals do not have the right to spread disease to others.

That the fatality rate alone isn't a good enough reason to throw the nation into paranoid, throw-your-rights-down-the-toilet, lockdown mode.
You sound like you write for Fox. You don't have the right to spread HIV to others.

How do you plan to accomplish that, without putting them in a concentration camp, confining them to a maximum security prison in solitary confinement, or killing them?
You prevent them from spreading the disease to others. Just to play your absurd game, they are dead already. If they are intent on transmitting the disease to others, they should be confined. We confine TB patients who are non compliant, yersinia pestis, ebola, SARS. It is only because of the political special interest groups who comprise the majority of HIV carriers that we treat this ONE disease differently. Politics.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 07:05 PM
Who said publicly? A dated medical access ID card would suffice.And how would you obtain the data to put on that card? Force every citizen to undergo HIV testing every six months? What about the ones who hide or resist?

Furthermore, you might as well just make it an armband with a pink triangle and bright red "+" plus sign, because there is little practical difference between that, and a "Hi, my name is X and I am HIV positive" ID card. You don't see any liberty issues with that?The right to privacy is subordinate when it comes to harming others.You have MRSA. I don't. Should you be forced to live in medical isolation for the rest of your life so that I don't get it?Removing those who have a virus from those who don't always works.Only in theory. In practice, it never works at eradicating disease, especially a disease like HIV that shows no symptoms for years.

Also, since geography is no longer a limiting factor disease, you can never eliminate HIV in the United States just by taking action inside the United States. (Case in point: we got it from Haiti (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7068574.stm).)

The only practical way to eliminate HIV is to develop a vaccine and vaccinate the entire world with it. And even then you can never be 100% sure that it's gone -- just look at the religious nutjobs who refuse vaccinations for their kids, or the impoverished in Africa who breed prodigiously even though they have no means of protecting their kids from disease.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 07:12 PM
Testing should be mandatory.Why? If you can protect yourself with voluntary action, you should not demand State-sponsored involuntary action.

Have yourself and your partner tested, and you will achieve your goal -- for you. Why on Earth would you then care whether some gay guy thousands of miles away is or isn't getting tested?

What justification do you have for forcing people who obviously don't care about HIV as much as you do to get tested, when you already have the means to protect yourself?If they are intent on transmitting the disease to others, they should be confined. We confine TB patients who are non compliant, yersinia pestis, ebola, SARS.Totally different situations. There are very few of those patients, their conditions aren't both chronic and incurable, and the conditions have highly visible symptoms.

So I ask you again, how do you plan to "confine" one million people, most of whom are asymptomatic and can live normal lives for decades?

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 07:14 PM
And generally speaking, Health & Safety Code section 120290 makes it a misdemeanor to willfully expose yourself or a third party if you are carrying any contagious, infectious, or communicable disease. (Yes, you read that right. You're a known criminal, countless times over.)

True, every healthcare provider is.

What are you going to do about it? Fire the million plus nurses who are MRSA positive?

Or the millions of occupational health claims to hospitals, gyms, nursing homes, and schools which have knowingly exposed their workers to these diseases?

Find me a lawyer, I want to sue. My hospital MADE me work in unsafe conditions FIRST.

Can you imagine a MILLION nurses sueing hospitals, schools, gyms, and nursing homes for just compensation, for their negligence?

Besides I wash my hands between every patient, and wear gloves.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 07:19 PM
So I ask you again, how do you plan to "confine" one million people, most of whom are asymptomatic and can live normal lives for decades?
I only want to "confine" the non compliant ones.

I want to isolate the rest. Prevent them from spreading the virus.

If you do that for a decade or two, the virus will be essentially wiped out(from the US). And then you will have nothing to worry or fret about.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 07:25 PM
I only want to "confine" the non compliant ones.

I want to isolate the rest. Prevent them from spreading the virus.HOW will you do that? How will you distinguish between compliant and non-compliant ones? Where will you put all the "non-compliant" ones? How will you even identify all HIV+ people in the first place?

There is no redundancy in your system, so if it's not perfect, it will fail miserably. Remember, all your troubles began with one guy from Haiti, 40 years ago.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 07:27 PM
What are you going to do about it?The same thing I'm going to do with all the HIV+ people who are free to walk the streets. Nothing.

My point was that spreading HIV, or any other disease, is not "100% legal" as you claimed. Intentionally spreading HIV is a very serious crime, and people are being charged and convicted of it all the time.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 07:32 PM
And how would you obtain the data to put on that card? Force every citizen to undergo HIV testing every six months? What about the ones who hide or resist?
"Hey baby, may I buy you a drink? Sure, show me the date on your card."
Simple. Just like the **** actors and actresses do.

Furthermore, you might as well just make it an armband with a pink triangle and bright red "+" plus sign, because there is little practical difference between that, and a "Hi, my name is X and I am HIV positive" ID card.
Exactly. HIV positive people should remove themselves from the general fvcking public. By choice. If they still want to pick up chicks at the local gay club or Tequilla Willies, they have the card, any prospects can decline the advances knowingly.

You don't see any liberty issues with that?
No, freedom to privacy is subordinate to your perceived freedom to harm another.

You have MRSA. I don't.
You probably do.
Should you be forced to live in medical isolation for the rest of your life so that I don't get it?
No, the point is that YOU should not "get any", not from any who are not infected. Fvck you, if you think you have the right to fvck uninfected people and give them your disease.

Only in theory. In practice, it never works at eradicating disease, especially a disease like HIV that shows no symptoms for years.
The ELISA test is technically a sign or symptom of the disease, and that shows up, what, at 6 months.

Also, since geography is no longer a limiting factor disease, you can never eliminate HIV in the United States just by taking action inside the United States.
We did it with SARS, what the hell are you smoking. We isolated it, quarantined it, stopped it. You don't even remember it, do you?>??>>? Because we eradicated it, with isolation. Gone, not a concern. Do you care about the people who were imprisoned at airports, in airplanes, or are stuck in China? You don't even remember them, do you. And all their lost liberties.


The only practical way to eliminate HIV is to develop a vaccine and vaccinate the entire world with it.
Make it then.

And even then you can never be 100% sure that it's gone -- just look at the religious nutjobs who refuse vaccinations for their kids, or the impoverished in Africa who breed prodigiously even though they have no means of protecting their kids from disease.
Well, ya, that point was so obvious to be moot. You are talking less than 50 per year, as opposed to 50K per year. As soon as those people who have it, who don't expose others, and will eventually die off, there will be no existing people to transmit it. Of course you are going to have the random sex tourist who brings it back from Taiwan or wherever...but it would be quickly stopped in its tracks with the same isolation methodology. Um, don't let the fxcker **** chicks or dudes who don't have it. He can pork all the HIV+ he likes, but there won't be much left for him(cause they are all gone, and don't exist anymore). Sucks to be him. There will always be those who try and bring the disease back in from overseas or across the border. Isolate them.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-30-2007, 07:33 PM
The same thing I'm going to do with all the HIV+ people who are free to walk the streets. Nothing.

My point was that spreading HIV, or any other disease, is not "100% legal" as you claimed. Intentionally spreading HIV is a very serious crime, and people are being charged and convicted of it all the time.

You are an idiot if you are equating Staph with HIV.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 07:44 PM
"Hey baby, may I buy you a drink? Sure, show me the date on your card."
Simple. Just like the **** actors and actresses do.Ironic, and almost hilarious. Your system is premised on voluntary action, yet you refuse to take voluntary action yourself.

If we could rely on voluntary action to prevent people from doing stupid things, we could solve most of the world's problems. We could certainly solve major killers such as drunk driving and drug use if people could be trusted to take simple voluntary action to protect themselves. But they can't.

However, YOU can decide whether YOU take that voluntary action. Ask your partner to get tested, and you will have an even more reliable indicator of infection than your proposal, because it's done right away as opposed to months ago.

No legislation is necessary. We can make it even easier by commercializing and subsidizing the rapid HIV test. You'll have your result before foreplay is over.

The only remaining issue, then, is YOU. You're too afraid or too lazy to ask your partner to get tested. In which case, the problem, and what needs fixing, is you, not the system.

Tudamorf
10-30-2007, 07:46 PM
You are an idiot if you are equating Staph with HIV.We did it with SARS, what the hell are you smoking.You're an idiot if you are equating SARS with HIV. For all the reasons I mentioned, and which I won't repeat yet again.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-31-2007, 02:11 PM
You're an idiot if you are equating SARS with HIV.

1) It is a fatal disease
2) Highly communicable, spread by person to person contact
3) Isolation and quarantine will contain it easily
4) It is a virus

5) It is droplet spead, which makes it like TB(which is a mycobacteria not a virus)

http://www.cdc.gov/NCIDOD/SARS/factsheet.htm

Staph can live on fomites and surfaces, and is a normal flora to humans. Is a bacteria. Not only spread by person to person, but surface to person. Not normally considered an airborne pathogen, but can be. Not normally fatal(MRSA) unless one is immune compromised.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
10-31-2007, 02:13 PM
Ironic, and almost hilarious.

I find it interesting that you don't know anyone who lies.

Tudamorf
10-31-2007, 02:55 PM
1) It is a fatal disease
2) Highly communicable, spread by person to person contact
3) Isolation and quarantine will contain it easily
4) It is a virusThe key facts are, SARS symptoms show up within days, not years; it's less than 10% fatal overall (down to 1% for healthy young adults); and if you don't die, you recover in a couple of weeks.

Epidemiologically, SARS and HIV are like night and day.

Tudamorf
10-31-2007, 02:56 PM
I find it interesting that you don't know anyone who lies.If you don't trust your partner, do the test yourself.

After all, they can forge your proposed medical access ID card, too (and I suspect there would be a huge black market for those).

Fyyr Lu'Storm
11-01-2007, 02:44 AM
After all, they can forge your proposed medical access ID card, too (and I suspect there would be a huge black market for those).

Like there is in the p0rn industry, where there is money, mad money involved.

Shhhuuuriiight.

Tudamorf
11-01-2007, 05:20 AM
Like there is in the p0rn industry, where there is money, mad money involved.Totally different situation, for reasons which should be obvious (but which I can recite if necessary).

Fyyr Lu'Storm
11-01-2007, 05:41 PM
Totally different situation, for reasons which should be obvious (but which I can recite if necessary).

Recite away.

If the 'black market' does not happen in the sleaziest of businesses, where people depend on fvcking to make a buck(and not just an orgasm). If there were ever a motivation for a 'black market' of HIV results, it would be those, and it doesn't happen.

I am saying taking a proven model of success and implement it to the general population to save the lives of 50,000 people each year.

You want them to die instead, some punishment I suppose I infer from your posts, for careless behavior. But you don't want to punish them to take away a little privacy, privacy which allows them to continue to spread the virus, to kill other people.
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You want them to die, but not to lose privacy.

Hey, I am just about as misanthropic as the next cynical human hater, but even I don't want 50K people(each year) to die needlessly like you do.

You should start culturing plasmodia and vibrio and sprinkling it in your local lakes and such, with such a world view.

Tudamorf
11-01-2007, 06:29 PM
Recite away.One, the pr0n industry tests the actors once a month, it does not simply take their word for it. So there can't be a black market.

Two, losing the ability to star in a pr0n film is not even remotely comparable to being ostracized from society. You can do a million other jobs and live a perfectly normal life without getting paid to have sex on video.

Besides, you act as though the industry's system is foolproof; it's not, they've had their share of outbreaks over the years despite all those precautions.You want them to die, but not to lose privacy.No, it is I who doesn't want to lose privacy.

As for people who deliberately engage in risky behavior without taking simple precautions, they'll get what's coming to them. I have no patience for coddling stupid people who have no interest in helping themselves. Go ahead, stand in front of an oncoming train, or play Russian Roulette; I won't try to stop you. It's natural selection at work.

Fyyr Lu'Storm
11-01-2007, 07:10 PM
One, the pr0n industry tests the actors once a month, it does not simply take their word for it. So there can't be a black market.
I would be fine for every doctor or hospital visit. Drivers license renewal, or once every 6 months for a welfare check.

Every arrest for solicitation or prostitution(once a month, otherwise and if possible).

Everytime you go to Walgreens to buy your IV needles.

Everytime you sell your blood down at the local blood bank.


Two, losing the ability to star in a pr0n film is not even remotely comparable to being ostracized from society. You can do a million other jobs and live a perfectly normal life without getting paid to have sex on video.
P0rn stars don't have to deal with being ostracized from society? If the ones who are not able to work in p0rn, because they are HIV+, are they ostracized(additionally) for being HIV+? It's not like it would be a secret.

Besides, you act as though the industry's system is foolproof; it's not, they've had their share of outbreaks over the years despite all those precautions.
Well, of course. But when you factor in per occurance odds, it is microscopic in comparison to the amount of sex normal people engage in.

No, it is I who doesn't want to lose privacy.
You will only lose your privacy if you have HIV. I am sorry that you do. Sucks to be you, you should have been more careful, huh?

Besides, you are doing a community service, with that lost privacy. HIV will be virtually eradicated from the US within 20 years. What a sport, atta boy, good job!

As for people who deliberately engage in risky behavior without taking simple precautions, they'll get what's coming to them.
Again, you prefer they die for their punishment, in lieu of one lost privacy, the privacy to conceal they are HIV carriers.


I have no patience for coddling stupid people who have no interest in helping themselves. Go ahead, stand in front of an oncoming train, or play Russian Roulette; I won't try to stop you. It's natural selection at work.
Blame the rape victim too, I suppose. Dress was too revealing, too much leg, too much boob,,,she deserved what she got, hey man? You sound exactly like the evangelicals, that it is Gods Wrath.

Dude, just because you got HIV, does not mean that you have a right to spread it to others. And knowledge that you have it, is the first step in isolating you from passing the virus to others.

Just like any other deadly disease, it should be treated like. But its not.

You only got your way because you belong to a strong political special interest group. Well, tell you what, you, or rather your methodology, are responsible for the thousands of deaths of all the other homosexuals, every year. Which could have been prevented with proven epidemiological provisions.

And before you jump on the homosexual thing. M2M sexual transmission is still the greatest factor. Seconded by those who have had M2M sex, and then had M2F sex and gave it to them.

Anyway, we have had this discussion before. You have stopped providing any further value to me with new arguments.

Let's go back to the Pope and asshole zealot pharmacists.

Tudamorf
11-01-2007, 07:53 PM
I would be fine for every doctor or hospital visit.Because prostitutes and drug addicts are so diligent when it comes to regular medical visits. <img src=http://lag9.com/rolleyes.gif>

And you'll just scare off the gays, and encourage them to set up black market doctors who don't test or to go to Mexico.Every arrest for solicitation or prostitution(once a month, otherwise and if possible).That has been done in California for years. Except for convictions, not arrests.P0rn stars don't have to deal with being ostracized from society?No, they don't.

They can test themselves, and if they are positive, they can just not work there, and live a normal life. There are a million other things you can do outside of being paid to have sex on video.You will only lose your privacy if you have HIV.No, my privacy is invaded by an unreasonable search even if it doesn't end up in a seizure. I shouldn't have to explain this to a professed libertarian.Besides, you are doing a community service, with that lost privacy. HIV will be virtually eradicated from the US within 20 years. What a sport, atta boy, good job!People who are HIV+ and don't want to spread the disease can (and often do) easily do so on their own.Blame the rape victim too, I suppose.Well, if she was standing naked, in a prison yard, with a giant down arrow painted on her chest, yelling "TAKE ME," then yeah, I'm going to blame the victim even if she didn't really want it.

I'm surprised at you, "don't blame the victim" is usually a mantra reserved for liberals who hope their sheep audience will nod in agreement without actually thinking about what it means.

In reality, there's nothing wrong with blaming the victim when the victim unreasonably and irresponsibly assumed a known risk.