We need your help! Your State Representative needs to hear from you. He or she serves on the Committee of the Illinois House which will consider a bill this week that denies critical health care options to women in the State of Illinois. House Bill 4346 allows pharmacists to substitute their religious and moral beliefs for a course of action prescribed by a woman's physician. The legislation, if adopted, would let a pharmacy or pharmacist refuse to fill a valid prescription of emergency contraception.

Please call your state representative and urge him/her to oppose House Bill 4346 when the House State Government Administration Committee considers the legislation on Wednesday, February 15th! You can find the members of the Committee and their contact numbers listed below.

House Bill 4346 unnecessarily permits a pharmacist to interfere with a patient's rights, and substitutes the pharmacist's judgment for individual health care needs determined by a woman's physician. Worse yet, House Bill 4346 contains no exception for women who are the victims of rape or incest. For these women, access to emergency contraception is critical to avoid pregnancy as a result of the assault. Sadly, this effort to limit women's health care is built on a fundamental mischaracterization of emergency contraction. It is NOT abortion. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved emergency contraception as a method of preventing pregnancy. Emergency contraception is simply a high dose of the same medication founding in birth control pills. It has no effect on an already-existing pregnancy and is NOT an abortafacient.

You can read more about House Bill 4346 at http://www.aclu-il.org/legislative/alerts/hb4346.pdf.

Members of the Illinois House State Government Administration Committee
Jack D. Franks -- 63rd District -- 217/782-1717
John E. Bradley -- 117th District -- 217/782-1051
Michelle Chavez -- 24th District -- 217/782-8173
Annazette Collins -- 10th District -- 217/782-8077
Lisa M. Dugan -- 79th District -- 217/782-5981
Bill Mitchell -- 87th District -- 217/782-8163
Richard P. Myers -- 94th District -- 217/782-0416
Harry R. Ramey, Jr. -- 55th District -- 217/558-1037
Ron Stephens -- 102nd District -- 217/782-6401

If you are not certain about who represents your State Representative district, you can look up your State Representative at http://www.elections.il.gov/DistrictLocator/SelectSearchType.aspx?NavLink=1.