A woman suspected that her prescribed birth control refill was delayed due to a Walgreens employee's religious beliefs.
The incident occurred following the controversial decision of the US Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade–leaving it up to individual states to determine the legality of access to reproductive healthcare even in cases of rape, incest and deadly complications.
Abigail Martin–a.k.a. @abigailmartiin–expressed her frustration in a video explaining why she wasn't able to receive her birth control this month.
She captioned the video with:
"I am so beyond pissed at our country right now."
Martin described the female employee who "helped" her during her visit to the pharmacy.
“I don’t want to be biased against any religion, but the lady that was helping me was older. She was one of the only people working there, they weren’t busy, and she had two crosses, not one, but two crosses hanging around her neck," she said.
“When I told her what I was there for, my birth control, she looks me up and down and goes, ‘hmm.’ Like, excuse me?"
"She then says, ‘yeah, we’re not going to refill that prescription, you need to call your provider.”
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
When Martin asked the employee if she "won't" or "can't" refill her prescription, she ignored her question and instructed Martin to call her provider instead.
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
After being unable to reach them the first time, Martin received a phone call a few hours later from her provider and spoke with a person who confirmed she still had four more refills left.
The provider told Martin they would call the pharmacy to find out why she was denied her refill.
At this point, Martin said her birth control was four or five days due. She finally received a message from the pharmacy notifying her that her prescription has been delayed, followed by another message indicating the birth control was now "out of stock."
Martin called Walgreens and spoke with an "amazing lady" this time who was confused as to why there was a problem refilling the approved prescription in the first place given there were four more refills left.
The woman on the phone then asked with whom Martin interacted at the pharmacy.
When Martin explained who it was, she was told the pharmacy has been having similar problems with that employee "for the last two weeks."
“They’ve been having a problem with women not being able to get their birth control for the last two weeks," said Martin.
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
@abigailmartiin/TikTok
Martin concluded her video with:
“So first, they want us to stop getting pregnant and having abortions, and then, they don’t want to help us prevent that pregnancy.”
“I’ve been trying to keep this video lighthearted, but access to healthcare should be a right and this should not be happening.”
She said in the comments that due to her delay in taking her medication, she's had "a week and a half long period, crazy nauseous, cramps, etc. all because my body isn’t used to being off."