Walgreens Patrons Boycott Over Refusal to Promote Beginning Management

Picture Supply: Getty / Joe Raedle

Walgreens is dealing with on-line backlash and calls to boycott after a number of clients had been allegedly denied contraception and condoms. #BoycottWalgreens is even trending on Twitter.

The latest criticism comes from Walgreens buyer Jessica Pentz, who tried to purchase condoms and was refused by the worker. The worker advised Pentz he couldn’t promote condoms attributable to his spiritual beliefs. Her husband later defined the incident on Twitter, and their expertise went viral.

In a press release to Newsweek, Walgreens spokesperson Kris Lathan mentioned that these types of cases are “very uncommon,” however workers should not required to finish transactions in opposition to their spiritual beliefs. “Our insurance policies are designed to make sure we meet the wants of our sufferers and clients whereas respecting the spiritual and ethical beliefs of our staff members,” Lathan mentioned. “We require the worker to refer the transaction to a different worker or supervisor on obligation who will full the client’s transaction.”

However Pentz’s expertise with Walgreens and its interference in clients’ reproductive selections is not an remoted occasion. One Twitter person posted about receiving a box of baby formula mailed to her door every week after shopping for a being pregnant take a look at at Walgreens throughout a formulation scarcity.

Expensive @Walgreens I obtained this bundle in the present day every week after buying a being pregnant take a look at at your retailer. I used to be requested to take the take a look at by my physician regardless of having no Fallopian tubes. 1/X pic.twitter.com/EZTsTPf7jd

— Nicole (@melancholynsex) July 17, 2022

In the meantime, 21-year-old Abigail Martin posted a TikTok video alleging that she was refused entry to her birth-control prescription and actively misled to consider she had no prescription refills left. After being on maintain for an hour by way of cellphone, Martin went right into a Walgreens, and the worker was an older girl with “two crosses hanging round her neck.” After contacting her supplier, Martin was assured she had refills however obtained conflicting messages from Walgreens claiming her contraception was delayed, then out of inventory. On the time of posting the TikTok, Martin nonetheless hadn’t obtained her contraception.

Following tales like these, clients are calling for others to #BoycottWalgreens. “I’ll boycott Walgreens which implies that I must keep away from the one within the city that I dwell, in addition to the one within the city the place I work,” one person wrote on Twitter. One other individual tweeted, “If a pharmacist has ‘ethical’ objections to drugs, they should not be a damned pharmacist. That is bull. #boycottWalgreensindeed.” Some celebrities have additionally expressed their dissent for these practices. “Effectively I am becoming a member of this boycott. Not acceptable. Ladies should not cattle. You do not personal us. #BoycottWalgreens,” wrote “The Dropout” star Michaela Watkins in a tweet.

The corporate has given nearly half 1,000,000 {dollars} to antiabortion-rights committees since 2016. These current outcries additionally come after the corporate’s donation to 11 members of the so-called Sedition Caucus or “Treason Caucus” — the Republican congressmen who voted in opposition to the certification of President Joe Biden’s 2020 victory within the presidential elections, even after pledging to droop these contributions.