A bill to legalize abortion is before the Tasmanian Legislative Council. It proposes severe penalties on physicians and counsellors who are unwilling to facilitate the procedure by referral. The Tasmanian chapter of the Australian Medical Association is opposed to the provision, and the state regulator, in supporting it, misrepresented the physicians’ ethical obligations. MLC Paul Harriss, though generally supportive of the bill, has described its treatment of conscientious objection as “heavy handed.” Another MLC, Tony Mulder, also appears to have some concerns regarding conscientious objection. [The Examiner]
Tag: Tasmania (Australia)
Australian regulator misrepresents physician obligations
Claim that practitioner codes require referral disproved by Australian Medical Association
According to a report in The Examiner, a representative of the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Association told a Tasmanian legislative committee that physicians who object to a procedure for reasons of conscience are obliged by professional codes of ethics to refer patients to another physician. Lisa McIntosh was addressing the Committee concerning a proposed Reproductive Health Bill.
Her assertion is contradicted by a submission by the Australian Medical Association Tasmania, which protested the section of the bill that would force objecting physicians to facilitate morally contested procedures by referral. The AMA Tasmania submission included quotes from the AMA Code of Ethics and a document from the Medical Board of Australia Good Medical Practice to demonstrate that the draft legislation information paper falsely claimed that there was a duty to refer.
The Committee also heard from Catholic Archbishop Adrian Doyle, whose concerns about the proposed bill included the mandatory referral provision.
Australian Medical Association Submission to the Tasmanian Government
On the law governing termination of pregnancy
Introduction
The Tasmanian branch of the Australian Medical Association expressed qualified support for statutory legalization of abortion in a submission to the Tasmanian state government concerning its proposed Reproductive Health (Access to Terminations) Bill 2013. However, the Association also emphasized its opposition to parts of the proposed bill that would suppress freedom of conscience among physicians. Those parts of the submission are reproduced below. [Read more . . .]