Category: Repression of Conscience

Doctors needed. Leave your conscience at home

 National Post

Marni Soupcoff

In a new paper, two prominent bioethicists suggest that all doctors should be required to see to it personally that any medical procedure — including abortions and assisted suicides — be performed for patients who request and qualify for them.

This should be the case, the authors argue, despite any personal moral or religious qualms the doctors may have about the operations or prescriptions in question. Sadly for devout Catholics, evangelical Protestants or others with deep religious or moral convictions, the prospect of medical school itself would be completely off the table if co-authors Udo Schuklenk and Julian Savulescu had their way; they argue that medical students should be screened for over-active consciences when it comes to things like contraception, abortion and euthanasia. Apparently those for whom these issues are anything but no-brainers shouldn’t be considered acceptable physician material at all. . . [Full text]

 

Bioethicist calls for a ban on doctors’ conscientious objection

The Sydney Morning Herald

Cameron Atfield

Doctors working in the public system should be banned from refusing to perform certain procedures, such as abortions, because of their religious beliefs, a leading bioethicist will argue in Brisbane next week.

Oxford-based Australian bioethicist Julian Savulescu will make the argument at a public lecture at the Queensland University of Technology’s Australian Centre for Health Law Research next Tuesday.

In his lecture, Professor Savulescu will also argue doctors and health professionals should only enter medical specialities in which their values would not be in conflict with routine legal medical procedures. . . [Full text]

“Now you want to crush every tiny focus of opposition”

Physicians’ Alliance Against Euthanasia Open letter to Mme Véronique Hivon

Note: Véronique Hivon, now a member of the Quebec National Assembly, was Minister of Health in the previous government and was responsible for bringing forward Quebec’s euthanasia law.

Mme Hivon:

You label as « ideology » the decision made by the McGill University Health Centre to not euthanize patients on the palliative care ward.

“The patients at the end of life are the ones who should have their rights respected and be at the centre of the organization of care”, you say. If that is what you really believe,

  • where were you when the number of palliative care beds at the MUHC was reduced for budgetary reasons?
  • When the specialized geriatrics unit was closed completely?
  • Why do you not speak out when patients are transferred all over the hospital and the city for trivial reasons, as is regularly done in Quebec?

What other than ideology could make you want to force hospitals, not only to kill patients, but to kill them in the one place where they most need to be protected?

Palliative care professionals are experts in easing the pain and suffering of terminally ill patients, accompanying them to the very end of their lives, with no need to kill them in order to do so. Now they are struggling, all over Quebec, to continue providing the same peace at the end of life in a situation where death is being promoted. Yes, promoted. This law was passed against the better judgment of those who know best how to care for the dying. Now you want to eliminate even the little safe space that is left for patients and professionals. All they ask for is one place in the hospital where there is no risk of being killed.

You got what you wanted when this law passed. Now you want to crush every tiny focus of opposition to your favourite project.

That is more than ideology. It’s intolerance, pure and simple.

We support the freedom of the palliative care professionals at the MUHC (and at every hospital) to ensure there are safe spaces for patients.

Yours truly,

[Original text and over sixty signatories]

 

Christian doctors challenge Ontario’s assisted-death referral requirement

Globe and Mail

Sean Fine

Groups representing more than 4,700 Christian doctors across the country have launched a court challenge to Ontario regulations that require them to refer patients to physicians willing to provide an assisted death, arguing the referrals are morally equivalent to participating in the procedure.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, however, takes issue with the faith groups’ position. “An effective referral does not foreshadow or guarantee an outcome,” college spokeswoman Tracey Sobers said in an e-mail.

Ewan Goligher, a doctor who works in the intensive care unit at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, said he considers himself a conscientious objector to doctor-assisted dying and supports the court challenge. “I think the patient is of greater value than their preference, and I cannot lift my hand to destroy that which is of fundamental value,” he said in an interview. . . [Full Text]

 

Winnebago County LPN Sues Over Loss Of Job Due To Religious Beliefs

Northern Public Radio

A licensed practical nurse is suing the Winnebago County Health Department over allegedly violating her religious conscience.

Sandra Mendoza worked in the pediatrics unit until it was consolidated with women’s health and began offering contraception and abortion referrals.  Citing her Catholic beliefs, she petitioned for an accommodation from the hospital.  Her attorney, Noel Sterett, says what was offered in July of last year, either inspecting food or nursing home work, amounted to a demotion. . . [Full Text]