Category: Law

Protection of conscience provision in new Tasmanian abortion law

The Reproductive Health (Access to Terminations) Bill 2013 passed the Tasmanian  Legislative Council 9-5 on 21 November [ The Examiner] and received Royal Assent today.  Abortions after 16 weeks will require the approval of two physicians.  The new Act includes a protection of conscience provision that exempts those who object to the procedure from participating in it, except when necessary to save the life of a woman or prevent serious physical injury.  There is no requirement for referral, but an objecting physician must provide a woman “seeking a termination or advice regarding the full range of pregnancy options” a “list of prescribed health services” from which she may seek advice.  Since, subject to the content of the list, this does not seem to be the equivalent of referral for abortion, the requirement may not be problematic for those concerned about indirect moral complicity.

What is not clear is whether or not the Act actually prohibits an objecting physician from providing information or advice about pregnancy options beyond the “prescribed” list.  Section 7(4) states that an objecting physician may continue to “provide treatment, advice or counselling, in respect of matters other than a termination or advice regarding the full range of pregnancy options” (emphasis added) which could be taken to imply that an objecting physician is not permitted to offer a woman anything other than the prescribed list.

 

Protection of conscience provision in Massachusetts assisted suicide bill

House Bill 1998 (2013)

An Act affirming a terminally ill patient’s right to compassionate aid in dying

Protection of conscience provisions are included in a bill to
legalize assisted suicide in Massachusetts for residents who are at least 18
years old and diagnosed with a terminal illness with a life expectancy of six
months or less.  It is not clear from the text of the statute whether or
not an objector is exempt from all parts of the assisted suicide process [per
Section 4(b)ii], or only from the requirement to actually provide the lethal
medication [per Section 4(1)].  Similarly, it is not clear whether or not
an objector is required to refer or otherwise assist a patient to find someone
who will provide a lethal prescription; Section 4(b)iv appears to imply an
expectation of referral or assistance.

Catholic Archdiocese of New York wins injunction

A federal court in New York has awarded the Catholic Archdiocese of New York a permanent injunction barring enforcement of the contentious federal regulation that requires objecting employers to pay for health insurance for contraception and surgical sterilization.  The federal government can appeal the ruling. [New York Times]

Protection of conscience bill to be proposed in Alabama

Representative Becky Nordgren of Alabama, is proposing a Health Care Right of Conscience Act in the state legislature.  The bill is intended to protect all health care providers from being compelled to participate, directly or indirectly, in abortion, human cloning, human embryonic stem cell research, and sterilization if they object to the procedures for reasons of conscience.  A health care provider must give an employer no less than 24 hours written notice of an objection.  An exception is made in the case of a procedure necessary to save the life of a patient.  Patricia Todd, a Representative apparently hostile to freedom of conscience for health care workers, asked “[W]hy are you in the health care profession if you don’t want to provide health care?” adding that there had been no attempts to regulate male impotence drugs or prostate exams. [Anniston Star]

American Civil Liberties Union sues U.S. Catholic Bishops’ Conference

A lawsuit has been filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) against the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), alleging that the health care directives of the Conference were responsible for the failure of a Catholic hospital to properly treat a woman who was miscarrying a pregnancy at 18 weeks gestation.  The incident subject of the lawsuit occurred in December, 2010 in Muskegon, Michigan.  The ACLU alleges that Tamesha Means was sent home twice by Mercy Health Partners in Muskegon without appropriate medical intervention, and received treatment only when she returned a third time and actually went into labour.  The suit also names Catholic Health Ministries Chairman Stanley Urban, and former chairpersons Robert Ladenburger and Mary Mollison as defendants.  They are named as individuals because Catholic Health Ministries (CHM) has status under Catholic Canon Law as a “public juridic person”   [Health Progress, March/April 2005] but has never been incorporated under the laws of Michigan or the United States. The ACLU contends that CHM was responsible for the enforcement of the USCCB directives.

Neither the hospital nor the treating physicians are named in the suit. As a result, the claim is not for medical malpractice or medical negligence by the physicians or hospital, but for negligence by the USCCB.  However, the hospital and treating physicians would be civilly liable for their actions regardless of USCCB directives, and their competence and clinical judgment would surely be central issues in evaluating what took place. If they were not negligent, it is difficult to see how the USCCB or CHM could be held to be negligent.

The substance of the complaint was released to the media before the USCCB was served.  In a response to media enquiries, the president of the USCCB insisted that the lawsuit was “baseless” and “misguided.”  John Haas, President of the National Catholic Bioethics Center, stated that the ACLU was selectively reading the directives, and that the suit was a means to advance a partisan cause, not “to obtain redress (for Means).”

“If they were concerned about a redress of grievances for this woman and medical malpractice,” he said, the suit should have been filed in a Michigan court naming the hospital and its staff as defendants.  He also pointed out the at the directives would have permitted the induction of labour in the circumstances alleged in the complaint, and likened the suit against the USCCB as suing the American Medical Association because a physician failed to follow its guidelines. [NCR]