The story is this: Biting Beaver had various problems with hormonal birth control, and switched to using condoms with her partner in order to prevent pregnancy. While they were having sex, the condom broke. She attempted to get EC in rural Ohio, where it is not yet available without a prescription (it will be available over-the-counter nation-wide as of January 1st). Her doctor sent her to the emergency room, where BB had to make a $100 co-pay. Even there, though, she couldn’t get what she needed:
“Well see,” he begins, his voice dropping a little, “the problem is that you have to meet the doctor’s criteria before he’ll dispense it to you.”
“Criteria?” I question.
“Well,” the nurse sounds decidedly nervous as though what he really wanted to do was hang up the phone completely, “Yes, his criteria. I mean…ummm…well, are you ok? Is there any, ummm….trauma?” he asks me.
My face changes expression and I hurry to explain, “No, no” I said, “No. I haven’t been raped. This was consensual sex.”
“Oh…” he trails off.
I wait expectantly.
“Well, ummm….*clears throat*…So you haven’t been raped?” he asks again.
“No. I have not been raped. The condom broke”. I state, becoming very frustrated at this point and wondering what the hell is going on.
“Ok, well ummm….Are you married?” he mumbles the words so low I can barely hear them.
Suddenly I get this image of the poor nurse standing at the hospital reading from a cue card that was given to him by a doctor.
“No.” I state plainly. “I am not married. I’ve been in a relationship for several years and I have three children, I don’t want a fourth.” I respond tersely.
“Oh, I see.” He says and then he hurries on, “Well, see. *I* understand. I want you to know that I understand what you’re saying. But see, the problem is that we have 4 doctors here right now but only one of them ever writes EC prescriptions. But see, the thing is that he’ll interview you and see if you meet his criteria. Now, I called the pharmacy but I also talked to him and well….*clears throat*….you can come down and try to get it. You know, if you meet his criteria he’ll give you a prescription, I mean, there’s really no harm in trying.” the nurse trails off, his voice falters as I realize what I’m being told.
He continues, almost over eager at this point to distance himself from the hospital, “See, I understand what you’re saying and all. I think it’s a good thing that it’s going over the counter. I just thought I should tell you what he told me. You know, you’ll just have to have an interview with him and he’ll see if you meet his criteria. He’ll only be on duty until 2pm today though and you should ask for him if you decide to come down because he’s really your only chance.”
I sigh and thank him before hanging up. I know exactly what he was telling me. If I wasn’t raped and wasn’t married then too damn bad for me.
I opened the phone book again and called the Urgent Care in my county. Who knows, maybe they’ll do it for me. “No,” the nurse said, “We don’t prescribe the abortion pill here”.
“No, wait I’m not asking for the abortion pill. I’m asking for EC!” I say, “It’s not the same thing.”
“Well, we use the words interchangeably here. Sorry, we don’t prescribe it”. She all but races to get off the phone with me.
I start looking through the telephone book, dialing hospitals from counties all around me. It seems that nobody will prescribe it to me. None of the hospitals are willing to touch me, of the ones that will prescribe it I am asked a series of questions to ‘screen’ me before I come to the hospital. The results aren’t good. I’m not married and wasn’t raped, so there’s very little they can do for me. But I can try the nurses tell me uncomfortably.
“But if I go through all this and I can’t get it will I still be charged the co-pay?”
“Well….ummmm…yeah. I’m afraid so Ma’am.” comes the reply.
I called every hospital in every surrounding county and none of them would prescribe me EC. Not even ONE. Of the 2 that said that they sometimes will their ‘criteria’ was clearly not my situation.
Next I tried Planned Parenthood. None of them were open. Not one. Every Planned Parenthood in Ohio was either closed on Saturday or would be closed before I could drive the 100 miles to them.
I was told by every urgent care I called and every emergency room that I was shit out of luck. I was asked my age. My marital status. How many children I had. If I had been raped and when I became uncomfortable with the questions I was told, “Well Ma’am, try to understand that you will be interviewed and the doctor has ‘criteria’ that you need to meet before he will prescribe it for you.”
When I asked about what ‘criteria’ there was that I had to meet, the reply was, “Well, he’s kind of old fashioned”. I was told that I might be able to ‘talk him into it’ anyway and that it can’t hurt to try (except for the fact that each and every time I try it I’ll have to pay $100 co-pay).
I found that the more hospitals and clinics and doctors I called the more ashamed I became. Yep, you heard right. I was feeling ashamed at being such an unworthy dirty whore. Well, at least in the eyes of all these hospitals and doctors and clinics. I cried, then I sweated, then I cried some more, then I called some more.
The “criteria” for accessing medical care has absolutely nothing to do with her medical history. It has to do with whether or not the gatekeepers to that care consider her worthy enough of it. And her worth is determined by the contexts in which she had a penis inside of her vagina.
It’s a disturbing story, and my heart goes out to her. On the bright side, EC will soon be available over the counter, and hopefully fewer women will have experiences like BB’s. On the not-so-bright side, pharmacists are appointing themselves as the rulers of women’s uteruses, and often refusing to fill EC prescriptions — you can imagine that those same pharmacists will further refuse to offer EC over-the-counter. So while OTC status is a step in the right direction, it doesn’t do much good if pharmacists refuse to do their jobs.
Thanks to BB for sharing her story.