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Medical marijuana dispensary raided at Tahoe The Associated Press Published: Saturday, Jan. 24, 2009 SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. -- Federal agents have raided a medical marijuana dispensary at South Lake Tahoe. Five agents from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency were joined by local and federal authorities when they served a search warrant Thursday on Patient to Patient Collective. DEA Special Agent Gordon Taylor says agents seized between five and 10 pounds of processed marijuana and a small amount of U.S. currency from the dispensary. Taylor declined to release additional details on the raid, saying the dispensary is part of an...

harmacy-benefits manager Express Scripts Inc. said some of its clients have received anonymous letters threatening to expose the personal information of patients. Express Scripts said it believes the threats, which were sent to sponsors who offer its prescription-drug plans rather than directly to patients, are related to an extortion attempt it disclosed last week. The letters include personal details about patients, such as names, dates of birth and Social Security numbers, Express Scripts spokesman Steve Littlejohn said. They are similar to an extortion letter Express Scripts received in early October threatening to expose personal data about "millions" of patients covered...

Chantilly, VA (LifeNews.com) -- Just as a network of thousands of pregnancy centers that provide women with non-abortion pregnancy help counters the hundreds of abortion businesses, a new pro-life pharmacy that eschews abortion and birth control could be the start of new pharmacies that provide safe havens.Those safe havens would protect pharmacists from being forced to dispense abortion drugs or birth control and allow customers to know they are supporting a pro-life option to companies that violate the consciences of medical professionals.Divine Mercy Care Pharmacy opened today in Chantilly, Virginia with a blessing of the building by the Most Reverend...

Va. pharmacy caters to pro-life customers Will stock no birth control Julia Duin (Contact) Tuesday, October 21, 2008 When Divine Mercy Care Pharmacy opens Tuesday in a Chantilly shopping center, it will have on display a picture of St. John Leonardi, the 16th-century patron saint of pharmacists. But there will be no birth-control pills, condoms, cigarettes or pornographic magazines. There will, however, be booklets on natural family planning. DMC Pharmacy is one of the country's few "pro-life pharmacies" that refuse to dispense contraceptives on moral and health grounds, arguing that they cause abortions, lead to promiscuity or endanger a woman's...

A woman was refused the "morning-after pill" by a supermarket's duty pharmacist because it was against his religious beliefs. Ruth Johnson, 33, who has two children, including a month-old baby, had not been using her usual method of contraception with her fiancée. She went to the Tesco dispensary in Hewitts Circus, Cleethorpes, Lincs, and asked an as assistant for the pill Levanelle. Miss Johnson was told it could only be dispensed by the locum pharmacist who was called to speak with her. She said: "He came out from behind a screen and told me that he would not be allowing...

Mike Koelzer Grand Rapids, Sep 16, 2008 / 12:24 am (CNA).- Citing ethical objections and the potential of some contraceptive drugs to cause abortions, some pharmacies in the United States have decided not to carry contraceptives. One such store is Kay Pharmacy in Grand Rapids, Michigan, owned by Mike Koelzer, who explained his decision not to carry contraceptives in an e-mail interview with CNA. Koelzer explained that he stopped supplying birth control pills because, as is written on the drugs’ packaging inserts, such pills decrease the lining of the mother’s uterus. This makes the womb less hospitable for a...

Chantilly, VA, Jun 17, 2008 / 06:10 am (CNA).- A pro-life pharmacy which will not stock contraceptives will open this August in Chantilly, Virginia, is joining several pharmacies around the country that accommodate workers with objections to distributing contraceptives.The DMC Pharmacy, located in a shopping plaza near a major thoroughfare, aims to support pharmacists and other health-care workers whose consciences do not allow them to distribute such products, the Washington Post reports. The DMC Pharmacy is an expansion of Divine Mercy Care in Fairfax, Virginia, a nonprofit healthcare organization that adheres to the teachings of the Catholic Church. "We're...

The Walgreen Co, which operates Walgreens drug stores, has agreed to stop altering prescriptions without physician approval as part of a multi-state agreement to settle allegations of improper billing, according to Tennessee Attorney General Bob Cooper. Walgreens was accused of switching the dosage forms on three medications commonly prescribed for Medicaid patients without doctor approvals in order to boost profits. This resulted in Medicaid programs nationwide paying much more for the medications than they normally would have, according to a press release by the attorney general’s office. Walgreen Co. agreed to comply with state and federal laws on the matter,...

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- From a simple storeroom for the pope's pills to a bustling drugstore open to the public, the Vatican pharmacy has come a long way in 134 years. The Vatican says the pharmacy is the busiest in the world; some 2,000 customers stream through its doors daily. The booming business and crowded store led officials to recently expand and open a whole new wing dedicated to top-brand beauty-care products and sparkly glass bottles of perfume. If it weren't for the large antique, hand-painted ceramic "arborelli," or medicinal urns, topping the cabinets and the portraits of Pope Benedict...

SAN FRANCISCO (Map, News) - San Francisco would become the first city in the nation to ban the sale of tobacco in pharmacies if legislation that was quietly introduced by Mayor Gavin Newsom is approved. If the Board of Supervisors adopts the legislation, hundreds of pharmacies in The City would have to stop selling tobacco products — including cigarettes, cigars, pipes and chewing tobacco — as soon as October. “This is a sensible measure to deal with health problems before they start, and it’s consistent with our prevention-focused efforts such as Healthy San Francisco and Shape Up SF,” Newsom said....

ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: November 8th, 2007 01:07 PM A federal judge has suspended Washington’s requirement that pharmacists sell “morning-after” birth control pills. The injunction says pharmacists can refuse to sell the morning-after pill, referring a customer instead to a nearby source. It’s part of a lawsuit by two pharmacists and a drugstore owner, who claim in a lawsuit that the state’s birth-control sales rules violated their civil rights. The morning-after pill, sold as “Plan B,” can dramatically lower the risk of pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of unprotected sex. Some critics consider the pill tantamount to abortion, although it...

TRENTON, New Jersey, November 5, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The state of New Jersey has passed a law denying the conscientious objection right of pharmacists, won in other states through lengthy court battles, to refrain from dispensing abortifacient and contraceptive drugs.   “Discussions of morals and matters of conscience are admirable, but should not come into play when subjective beliefs conflict with objective medical decisions,” said state Sen. Joseph Vitale, D-Middlesex, a bill sponsor.   The decision comes just days after Pope Benedict XVI gave his support to pharmacists worldwide who reject the culture of death in their profession. “Pharmacists must...

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.

CHICAGO - Nearly two-thirds of academic leaders surveyed at U.S. medical schools and teaching hospitals have financial ties to industry, illustrating how pervasive these relationships have become, researchers say. Serving as paid consultants or accepting industry money for free meals and drinks were among the most common practices reported by the heads of academic departments. Drug companies and makers of medical devices often use these connections to influence doctors to use products that aren't necessarily in the patient's best interest, said Eric Campbell, the study's lead author. He is a researcher at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Since...

The story is on top and the poll is on the bottom

BARTOW, Fla. — A jury awarded $25.8 million Friday to the family of a cancer patient who was given a wrong prescription, had a stroke and died several years later, lawyers said.Beth Hippely was prescribed Warfarin, a blood thinner, in 2002 to treat breast cancer. The prescription filled at a Walgreen pharmacy was 10 times what her doctor prescribed, court documents said. The Polk County Circuit Court jury found the prescription error caused a cerebral hemorrhage resulting in permanent bodily injury, disability and physical pain. The mother of three died in January at the age of 46. A 19-year-old pharmacy...

Seattle, Jul 27, 2007 / 08:47 am (CNA).- Pharmacists have sued Washington state over a new regulation that requires them to sell emergency contraception, also known as the "morning-after pill,” because it contains no exception for those who object on the basis of belief or conscience. In a lawsuit filed in federal court Wednesday, pharmacists Rhonda Mesler and Margo Thelen, and Stormans Inc., said the rule that took effect Thursday violates their civil rights by forcing them into choosing between "their livelihoods and their deeply held religious and moral beliefs." "The stakes really couldn't be much higher," plaintiffs' attorney Kristen...

Explicitly prohibits not filling prescription "due to sincerely held moral, philosophical or religious beliefs” By John Jalsevac TRENTON, N.J., June 12, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A bill passed yesterday by the New Jersey legislature requires pharmacists to fill all prescriptions, even if doing so violates the religious or personal beliefs of the pharmacist. The bill passed with a vote of 56-18. Currently it only awaits the signature of Gov. Jon Corzine in order to become law, as it was already passed by the Senate last June.The official text of the bill reads: “A pharmacy practice site has a duty to properly...

COLUMBUS, Wis. (AP) - April 17, 2007 - - It's not often that a bomb squad is asked to help clean up a pharmacy. But experts say a 2-ounce sample of picric acid in the basement of Sharrow Drug Store packed the punch of nearly half a stick of dynamite. Store employees found the sample Thursday as they were cleaning out old chemicals. Store owner Nick Sharrow is relieved that the local bomb squad safely destroyed the sample Friday, saying its explosive capability was stunning. "This is very similar to TNT," Sharrow said.

The more than two million senior citizens nationwide who signed up last year for Humana Inc.'s least expensive Medicare prescription drug plan face average premium increases of 60 percent -- and in seven states, increases of 466 percent -- starting tomorrow . The higher prices will affect about 50,000 seniors in Massachusetts, where premiums are going up by 130 percent, from $7.32 to $16.90 a month. Medicare added the prescription drug benefit in 2006, and in most states dozens of drug plans with varying coverage are available through insurance companies. Healthcare advocates say Humana kept its prices low in 2006...