Tag: New York

Willowbrook, the institution that shocked a nation into changing its laws


Patients needing “tenderness and affection” got the opposite

Timeline

Matt Reimann

When World War II ended, a large Staten Island facility on 375 acres of land faced an uncertain future. Some believed that Willowbrook should be used for the care of disabled veterans, but ultimately the preferences of New York governor Thomas Dewey won out. Dewey argued that there were thousands of children in the state who were “mentally and physically defective and feeble minded, who never can become members of society,” who needed to be cared for with a “high degree of tenderness and affection.” On this last matter, the institution would utterly fail: In the coming decades, Willowbrook would become synonymous for social injustice, moral abhorrence, and the glaring failures of the state psychiatric system. . . [Full text]

New York Hospital Agrees to Respect Rights of Pro-Life Nurses

The Foundry

Thomas Messner

Mount Sinai Hospital in New York has agreed to additional policy and procedure changes to protect the conscience rights of pro-life nurses and other employees as a result of a federal investigation.

In 2009, the hospital allegedly forced a Catholic pro-life nurse to assist in an abortion in violation of the nurse’s religious beliefs. Read more . . .

 

Mt. Sinai Ends Forced Abortion-Participation Policy

 News Release

Alliance Defending Freedom

A newly completed U.S. Department of Health and Human Services investigation of New York’s Mt. Sinai Hospital has resulted in additional policy and procedure changes to ensure that medical personnel are not forced to participate in abortions. Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys representing a Mt. Sinai nurse requested the HHS Office of Civil Rights investigation after the hospital forced her to assist in an abortion in violation of her religious beliefs in 2009.

The changes come in addition to a new policy the hospital adopted after Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys filed a lawsuit on behalf of the nurse, Cathy Cenzon-DeCarlo.

“Pro-life medical personnel shouldn’t be forced to participate in abortions, and the new policies and procedures at Mt. Sinai reflect that,” said Senior Legal Counsel Matt Bowman. “The hospital seems to have decided to do the right thing and respect the conscience rights of its employees, who are protected by both federal and state law. We will continue to monitor the situation to make sure that the new policy is followed.”

Mt. Sinai’s policy revision states, “It is the legal right of any individual to refuse to participate in these procedures.” The policy applies regardless of whether the abortion is classified as an elective or emergency procedure and provides a process for “alternative coverage” in the event a staff member opts not to participate.

As a result of the HHS investigation, Mt. Sinai agreed to go further by putting in writing that it will abide by federal conscience protection laws, train employees about the hospital’s obligation to those laws and how to properly keep records of those who are objecting or not objecting to participating in abortions, and update a Human Resource policy to state that the hospital will not engage in any form of employment discrimination based on an employee’s refusal to participate in an abortion.

Administrators at Mt. Sinai Hospital threatened DeCarlo with disciplinary measures in May 2009 if she did not honor a last-minute summons to assist in a scheduled late-term abortion. Despite the fact that the patient was apparently not in crisis at the time of the surgery, the hospital insisted on her participation in the procedure on the grounds that it was an “emergency,” even though the procedure was not classified by the hospital as such. The hospital has known of the Catholic nurse’s religious objections to abortion since 2004.

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys asked HHS to investigate in March 2010 and filed, together with lead counsel and allied attorney Joseph Ruta, the lawsuit Cenzon-DeCarlo v. The Mount Sinai Hospital in Kings County Supreme Court the following month. The lawsuit argues that Mt. Sinai violated state conscience laws as well as state laws against religious employment discrimination and intentionally inflicting emotional distress on an individual. The suit, which is still ongoing, also includes five other claims based on DeCarlo’s coerced participation in the abortion. A federal court dismissed Cenzon-DeCarlo’s federal suit filed in July 2009.

 

Update on American HHS birth control mandate controversy

On 14 December, Tom Monaghan, the founder of Domino’s Pizza, filed a lawsuit against the HHS regulation [Associated Press].  Five days later, a federal appeals court reinstated lawsuits filed by Wheaton College and Belmont Abbey that had been dismissed by a lower court.  The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals also ordered the Obama administration to report every sixty days on its progress in redrafting the regulation to accommodate employers with religious objections to providing insurance for birth control.[Life News]  News of the Wheaton and Belmont decisions came too late for inclusion in a column in the  New England Journal of Medicine, which outlined the litigation and the issues.The federal Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a lower court ruling that Hobby Lobby must comply with the mandate because it does not impose a “substantial burden” on the exercise of freedom of religion by the company’s owner. [The Hill]  In contrast, O’Brien Industrial Holdings of Missouri was granted an injunction by an appeals court that prohibits the federal government from enforcing the regulation.  The decision overturns a lower court ruling [The Foundry, 3 December].  A similar injunction was granted to the Griesedieck family‘s American Pulverizer Company in Minnesota [National Review] Commenting that there is no “trust us changes are coming” clause in the U.S. Constitution, a federal judge in New York upheld the right of the Catholic Archdiocese of New York to proceed with its lawsuit against the mandate. [Becket Fund, 6 December]    Meanwhile, the Little Sisters of the Poor, a Catholic religious order that provides nursing care to the elderly poor in 30 American cities, is considering the possiblity of leaving the United States if the current regulation stands. [LifeSite News]