BMJ Blogs
It seems that if you are a nurse you cannot be a good Catholic. Or, better: if you want to work as a nurse then you might have to give up some of your religious beliefs. A relatively recent decision of the UK Supreme Court, the highest court in the country, seems to suggest so. In a legal decision that made it into the general press (see here), the Supreme Court decided that two Catholic midwives could not refuse to undertake administrative and supervisory tasks connected to the provision of abortions.
To be sure, no one asked the nurses to directly assist in the provision of abortions. The Abortion Act 1967 says that “No person shall be under any duty … to participate in any treatment authorised by this Act to which he has a conscientious objection.” The Nurses argued that this provision of the Act should be understood widely. Not only should they be allowed to refuse to directly assist in abortion services: they should also be entitled to refuse to undertake managerial and supervisory tasks if those were linked to abortion services. The nurses’ employer was not impressed; neither was the Supreme Court which ruled that the possibility to conscientiously object only related to a ‘hands-on’ capacity in the provision of abortion services. . . [Full text]