Wal-Mart must carry contraceptive
The state pharmacy board ordered Wal-Mart on Tuesday to stock emergency contraception pills at its stores in Massachusetts.
Massachusetts is now the second state to require the world’s largest retailer to carry the morning-after pill.
A Wal-Mart spokesman said the company would comply with the directive by the Massachusetts Board of Pharmacy and is reviewing its nationwide policy on the drug.
Wal-Mart now carries the pill only in Illinois, where it is required to do so under state law. The company has said it “chooses not to carry many products for business reasons,” but has refused to elaborate.
The unanimous decision by the pharmacy board comes two weeks after three women, backed by abortion rights groups, sued Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart for failing to carry the drug in its 44 Wal-Marts and four Sam’s Club stores in Massachusetts.
The women had argued that state policy requires pharmacies to provide all “commonly prescribed medicines.”
Alexandria, Va.
Conspirator barred from courtroom
Confessed al-Qaida conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui again disrupted his sentencing trial with insults and epithets Tuesday and was barred from the courtroom while a jury is selected to decide whether he is put to death or imprisoned for life.
After verbally sparring with Moussaoui for about 15 minutes, U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema ordered that he must watch the remainder of jury selection on closed-circuit television from his courthouse cell. That could take until March 6, when opening statements are scheduled.
The 37-year-old Frenchman of Moroccan descent pleaded guilty last April to conspiring with al-Qaida to fly aircraft into U.S. buildings but has denied any role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Moussaoui claims to have been training to fly a 747 jetliner into the White House as part of a subsequent plot.
Concord, N.H.
Church leader in alcoholism rehab
The Episcopal Church’s first openly gay bishop, V. Gene Robinson, is being treated for alcoholism, a step that surprised friends and colleagues but seemed unlikely to threaten his position in the church.
A key administrative committee said it stood by Robinson, whose 2003 election as bishop of New Hampshire caused a furor in worldwide Anglicanism because he lives with a same-sex partner.
“I am writing to you from an alcohol treatment center where on Feb. 1, with the encouragement and support of my partner, daughters and colleagues, I checked myself in to deal with my increasing dependence on alcohol,” Robinson wrote in an e-mail to clergy Monday.
Columbus, Ohio
School board alters science standards
The Ohio school board voted Tuesday to eliminate a passage in the state’s science standards that critics said opened the door to the teaching of intelligent design.
The Ohio Board of Education decided 11-4 to delete material encouraging students to seek evidence for and against evolution.
The 2002 science standards said students should be able to “describe how scientists continue to investigate and critically analyze aspects of evolutionary theory.” The standards included a disclaimer that they do not require the teaching of intelligent design.
Ohio school board member Martha Wise, who pushed to eliminate the passage, said the panel took the correct action to avoid problems posed by the science standards, including the possibility of a lawsuit.
Supporters of the eliminated passage pledged to force another vote.
Compiled from wire reports