Category: Religion

Cardinal urges Ontario gov’t not to ‘bully’ doctors into helping euthanize patients

Lifesite News

Pete Baklinski

TORONTO, March 24, 2017 (LifeSiteNews) — Doctors who refuse to kill a patient “need protection so that they can act according to their conscience,” Cardinal Thomas Collins, Archbishop of Toronto, told the Ontario legislature on Thursday.

“It is sad that I and others need to come before you today to urge you to protect these devoted healers from the punishment which they face if they refuse either to administer a lethal injection to their patients or, in effective referral, to arrange for that injection to be administered,” he told Ontario’s Standing Committee on Finance & Economic Affairs. . . . [Full text]

 

UK church leaders: Pharmacists could be forced to dispense lethal drugs

Crux

Simon Caldwell

The General Pharmaceutical Council in the UK announced in a statement that personal values and beliefs should not compromise person-centered care. The statement caused concern among bishops and Catholic organizations that British pharmacists could be forced to dispense lethal drugs under plans to prohibit conscientious objection on the grounds of religion.

MANCHESTER, England – The Catholic Church has predicted that British pharmacists could be forced to dispense lethal drugs under plans to prohibit conscientious objection on the grounds of religion. . . [Full text]

Rome hospital insists gynaecologists perform abortions

San Camillo hospital ad rekindles church versus state debate on reproductive rights

The Irish Times

Paddy Agnew

An Italian hospital’s insistence that applicants for two gynaecology vacancies be prepared to carry out abortions, or face dismissal, has rekindled a church versus state debate on women’s reproductive rights.

Under Italy’s 1978 abortion legislation, any doctor in the public service may decline to carry out a pregnancy termination on grounds of “conscientious objection”. The percentage of conscientious objectors in Italy is about 70 per cent nationwide, and as high as almost 90 per cent in southern regions such as Sicily and Molise. . .[Full text]

 

New Mexico State Sen Gerald Ortiz y Pino proposes bill to stop freedom of conscience exemptions on abortions

The Global Dispatch

Kaye Wonderhouse

New Mexico’s State Senator, Gerald Ortiz y Pino, introduced Senate Bill 282, which would repeal religious exemptions for participating in abortions.

SB-282 states, “A hospital shall not refuse to provide a reproductive health service if withholding the reproductive health service would result in or prolong a serious risk to the patient’s life or health; and, where a failure to provide the reproductive health service would violate the medical standard of care owed the patient.” . . [Full text]

 

Dr. Coelho’s ‘crazy’ battle for conscience rights

The Catholic Register

Michael Swan

It’s not surprising patients fall in love with Dr. Ramona Coelho. Not just because she’s a young, pretty doctor who smiles easily, laughs frequently and focuses her attention completely on whoever is talking to her.

Her patients in London, Ont., know that she’s a doctor who is in it for something more than the status, money or security attached to most medical practices.

“I love my work,” Coelho confesses. “I love being a doctor. I love helping people and being with them — trying to find solutions for them.”

Her practice is heavily slanted to marginalized patients. Her waiting room is full of refugees, ex-cons, the poor. Many of her patients are on permanent disability. . . . [Full text]