Category: Countries

Nurses Triumphant! Human Rights Case Ends in Settlement

After a difficult five year struggle, eight Ontario health care professionals win the right to choose.

Markham-Stoufville, Ontario, Canada

Sue Careless*

Staff with religious objections will not be required to provide primary nursing care to a patient admitted for an abortion, but could be required to provide post-abortion nursing care. They would not, however, have to in any way participate “in the administration, monitoring or documenting of the pregnancy termination process.”

They did it!

After a five year battle, eight Ontario nurses won the right to refuse to assist in abortions at the Markham-Stoufville Hospital, just outside Toronto. The nurses had taken their fight to the Ontario Human Rights Commission, and one nurse, Ailene George, had filed a civil suit.

They hope their victory will be precedent-setting. “I want all nurses in the future to have the right to say, “No,” said Joanne Van Halteren, one of the eight. “This will have a ripple effect.”

The case was to be heard by the OHRC, but the sides reached a mediated settlement April 13 in which the hospital issued a policy respecting the nurses’ religious objections to performing abortions.

. . . The nurses’ battle took its toll. One nurse, Ann Mahon, died of cancer in May 1998. Others suffered stress-related illnesses. Una Clennon had a lump removed from her breast that her doctor believed was brought on by stress. [Full text]

 

Personal Qualms Don’t Count

Foothills Hospital Now Forces Nurses To Participate In Genetic Terminations

Calgary, Alberta, Canada

 Marnie Ko

 “The present mood is…chaotic, helpless, frustrated and highly emotional,” Sally wrote. In the past weeks, I have witnessed tears, breakdowns, illnesses, and stress such as never before…Sick calls have been high and experienced staff nearly impossible to recruit.”

 

Though the tiny infant had been condemned to die, distraught nurses at Calgary’s Foothills Hospital spent hours last August caring for it anyway.

“The mother didn’t want the baby, so we took turns rocking and holding it for 12 hours until it finally died,” says Foothills nurse “Catherine,” whose real name has been withheld to protect her job. “Nurses were only allowed to comfort the suffering infant, but this did not even include feedings.”

The rejected baby’s fate was sealed when it survived a “genetic termination,” an abortion performed only five weeks before the mother’s due date. Doctors had told her that her baby had lethal genetic defects. But Catherine could see only a baby. “I was sick for weeks,” she says. [Full text]

K-Mart pharmacist fired for refusing to dispense potential embryocide

 Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.A

Karen L. Brauer M.S. R.Ph*

I was fired from my position as a pharmacist with the KMart Corporation for refusal to dispense Micronor, a progestin-only  “minipill”, for the purpose of birth control.

. . . My name is Karen L. Brauer. My “alphabet soup” is M.S. R.Ph., and I am a practicing community pharmacist. Prior to this (my favorite) career, I had enjoyed a brief time in the field of medical research. On December 19, 1996, I was fired from my position as a pharmacist with the KMart Corporation for refusal to dispense Micronor, a progestin-only “minipill”, for the purpose of birth control.

My opinion of this form of birth control was formed 20 years ago, because that is when I became aware of its most prominent mechanism to prevent implantation (as distinguished from a primarily contraceptive mechanism). My instructors in dispensing lab at pharmacy school were made aware of my opinion of this type of birth control, as was the District Manager who hired me to work for KMart. For the seven years that I worked for KMart, I turned away prescriptions for progestin only birth control, more often than not, talking the women out of filling the prescription at all. The Greater Cincinnati Area is a very conservative part of the country, and “minipills” were never very hot sellers here. [Full Text]

Chinese health care workers and the ‘one-child’ policy

Since at least1991, Australia has been faced with Chinese women who apply for refugee status because of China’s ‘one-child policy.’  Senate committee hearings were conducted into the matter. One of the witnesses, who identifed herself by the pseudonym “Dr. Wong”, was heard by the committee in February, 1995, and July, 1999. The following extracts provide some information about the operation of the ‘one-child policy’ and the coercion of health care workers. [Full text]

Hospital Restricts Nurses’ Freedom of Conscience

Markham-Stoufville, Ontario, Canada

David Dooley

If the province can spend millions of dollars setting up abortion clinics, Stephens said, it can well afford to hire nurses prepared to take part in abortions, rather than forcing others to go against their consciences. . . . And if hospitals pride themselves on being responsive to the community, this one should make plain how the recent decision was made and why the nurses are under such compulsion.

In a column in the May issue of Thornhill Month, John Stephens asked, “Must it be a matter of either job or conscience?” Until now, he wrote, the Birthplace Unit at the Markham-Stoufville Hospital has been used as the name implies. Now, nurses in the unit who abhor abortions are being told either to assist at these procedures or accept transfer to another department. “For nurses who have developed great skill at the birthing process,” Stephens pointed out, “this means giving up the job they love, and losing the opportunity to practise their expertise. In other circles, this would be called wrongful dismissal.” [Full text]