Source: https://consciencelaws.org/archive/news/releases-2009.aspx
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 23:06:44+00:00

Document:
Senator Reid is shutting down debate in the Senate on health care reform and specifically the critical discussion on individual right of conscience and religious liberty.
WASHINGTON, D.C., December 15, 2009, U.S Senator Sam Brownback (KS) courageously introduced to the Senate an amendment to provide strong conscience protection for individuals and institutional health care providers including: health plans, health insurance issuers, purchasers and plan sponsors.
"Our Nation, America, was founded upon the principles of individual freedom, including the right to exercise religion and individual conscience", said Mike O'Dea, Director of Christus Medicus.
Understanding these foundations, and the importance of preserving individual liberties in any new health care legislation, Senator Brownback introduced the amendment to protect the rights of conscience against requiring "an individual or institutional health care provider to provide, participate in, or refer for an item or service to which such provider has a moral or religious objection, or require such conduct as a condition of contracting with a qualified health plan."
The concern is not that Senator Reid does not support the amendment, but that it should not even be considered, debated or voted upon.
Lasting and equitable health care reform cannot distance itself from ethical and moral decisions. When morally questionable practices are federally funded or required, it becomes an issue of religious freedom and a right of individual conscience.
must be considered", said O'Dea.
The Christus Medicus Foundation (CMF) is a non-profit organization dedicated to reclaim Christ-centered health care by educating religious leaders, policy makers and the American public on the need to reform corporate and public policy to allow God's people a "conscientious choice" in selecting health insurance.
ECLJ Warns About an Attempt by the Council of Europe to Undermine "Conscientious Objection"
(Strasbourg, France) - The European Centre for Law and Justice (ECLJ) is very concerned with a new draft resolution from the Council of Europe aimed to legally limit the freedom of medical doctors and health care providers who object to abortion.
This new draft Resolution is the last initiative taken by the Parliamentary Assemble of the Council of Europe in order to promote abortion and restrict freedom of religion and conscience. This new resolution, sponsored Ms HÃ¤gg and Ms Mc Cafertty (Doc. 11757 and AS/Soc 2009 15) is entitled "Women's access to lawful medical care: the problem of unregulated use of conscientious objection".
This resolution has two main objectives: the first - to push for further access to abortion as a "Human Right" - the second: to limit the possibility for individual health care providers and institutions "to refuse to provide certain health services based on religious, moral or philosophical objections." The "health services" targeted are mostly abortion, emergency contraception, assisted suicide and artificial procreation.
At the request of Members of Parliamentary Assemble, the ECLJ is currently preparing a memorandum in support to "conscientious objection" that will be submitted to the Parliament in the weeks ahead.
The European Centre for Law and Justice (ECLJ) is an international non-profit law firm dedicated to protecting human rights and religious freedom in Europe and worldwide. Attorneys for the ECLJ have served as counsel in numerous cases before the European Court of Human Rights. Additionally, the ECLJ has special Consultative Status with ECOSOC of the United Nations, and is accredited to the European Parliament.
The 16,000-member Christian Medical Association (CMA ), the nation's largest association of faith-based physicians, today voiced support for the conscience-protecting provisions in the "Empowering Patients First Act," bill introduced by Rep. Tom Price (R-GA 6th). CMA contended that the protections are needed to avoid a potentially catastrophic loss of faith-based healthcare on which millions of poor patients depend.
In a letter sent to Rep. Price today regarding the bill (HR 3400), CMA CEO Dr. David Stevens noted, "The Christian Medical Association is very concerned that some in Congress and the White House appear to be pursuing a conscience-hostile approach to healthcare legislation, opposing amendment after amendment that would provide solid-not rhetorically deceptive-conscience protections.
"Lawmakers must realize that threatening or minimizing conscience protections holds the potential to create a catastrophic shortage of healthcare access, especially for poor patients. Our national polling (available online at www.Freedom2Care.org) reveals that 95 percent of faith-based physicians are prepared to leave medicine altogether rather than violate their conscientiously held ethical convictions."
Dr. Stevens wrote, "As you know, President Obama has announced plans to rescind the relatively new federal provider conscience regulation, which also provides for such a reporting mechanism. It is imperative, therefore, to enact legislation that protects conscience rights from the whims of any administration that might minimize the opportunity to address civil rights violations related to conscience."
Dr. Stevens thanked Rep. Price for recognizing the need for strong, true and broad conscience protections."The bill [Sec. 106 Part (d) of HR 3400] also provides a critical component of conscience protections. Many healthcare professionals encounter pressure to violate ethical codes on many issues besides abortion. HR 3400 addresses this reality by offering appropriately broad conscientious protection 'to accommodate the conscientious objection of a purchaser or an individual or institutional health care provider when a procedure is contrary to the religious beliefs or moral convictions of such purchaser or provider.'"
In his letter, Dr. Stevens also noted the benefit of designating the Office of Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as a reporting outlet for healthcare professionals experiencing discrimination for their conscientious stance on ethical issues.
"Besides protecting any individual or institutional health care entity from discrimination 'on the basis that the health care entity does not provide, pay for, provide coverage of, or refer for abortions,' the bill also provides the crucial implementation avenue needed to make such protection effective."
Contact: Margie Shealy (423) 844-1047, margie.shealy@cmda.org.
Washington, DC - As coordinator of the Freedom2Care coalition of over 50 organizations, today the Christian Medical Association (CMA) sent a letter to President Obama indicating that over 10,000 individuals have signed a Freedom2Care petition urging the President and Congress to protect conscience rights and stop abortion mandates.
The letter to the President noted that "the problem of discrimination in health care and protecting conscience rights through both law and regulation are key to protecting patients access to health care now and in the future."
CMA CEO Dr. David Stevens said, "Our polling demonstrates that the American people by two-to-one margins support conscience-protecting laws and the conscience-protecting regulation that President Obama plans to get rid of. Our national survey of nearly 3,000 faith-based healthcare professionals reveals that conscience protections are vital to continuing the faith-based medical care that millions of patients depend upon.
"Protecting conscience rights and stopping abortion mandates are crucial for passing healthcare reform legislation. The Capps amendment in the House bill, which would publicly fund abortions, and the Kennedy amendment in the Senate bill, which would require physicians to perform or refer for abortions, are like lethal injections to the cause of healthcare reform.
"Our tri-partisan polling shows that 88% of American patients said it is either "very" or "somewhat" important to them that they share a similar set of morals as their doctors, nurses, and other healthcare providers. And 87% believed it is important to "make sure that healthcare professionals in America are not forced to participate in procedures and practices to which they have moral objections.
"It's time that the President and Congress get in step with the American people, stop trying to mandate and publicly fund abortions, and start protecting the conscience rights that are key to protecting access to healthcare for millions of poor patients."
(Washington, DC) - On Friday, the circuit court sitting in Springfield, Ill. issued a preliminary injunction in the case of two pharmacy owners, Luke VanderBleek and Glenn Kosirog. Both men have been fighting to protect their conscience rights. The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), focusing on constitutional law, is representing the pharmacists in the case of Morr-Fitz, Inc. v. Blagojevich.
This is the latest victory in an ongoing effort to protect the fundamental right of pharmacists to practice their profession without having to violate their conscience.
"The Attorney General's Office has repeatedly argued that the Health Care Right of Conscience Act does not apply to the practice of pharmacy-and they have repeatedly failed," said Francis J. Manion, ACLJ Senior Counsel. "While this is not a final decision on the merits of our lawsuit, the writing is on the wall. Our clients are entitled to run their pharmacies according to the dictates of their moral and religious beliefs. This is what the law allows; this is what the court has affirmed."
Serving as co-counsel in the case is Mark Rienzi, a professor of law at Catholic University of America, who argued the motion on Aug. 6th.
In the court's decision, Judge John W. Belz ruled that "Plaintiffs have certain and ascertainable rights under state and federal law. Plaintiffs are suffering irreparable harm in the form of an ongoing chill of their free exercise rights and rights of conscience under federal and state law, as well as unlawful coercion based on their religious and moral beliefs."
The judge went on to find that the plaintiffs "have a likelihood of success on the merits of their claims."
As a result of the injunction, the pharmacists will be permitted to refuse to dispense Plan B and other forms of emergency contraception, if doing so would violate their religious or moral beliefs.
The current case, Morr-Fitz, Inc. v. Blagojevich, seeks to ensure that pro-life pharmacy owners - not just individual pharmacists - receive the legal protection to which they are entitled under state laws as well as the U.S. Constitution.
The injunction will remain in place until a final ruling in the case is issued.
WASHINGTON, Aug. 19 /Christian Newswire/ -- Students at Catholic universities across the nation are banding together with students at Belmont Abbey College in a stand for religious liberty and conscience rights.
Students from the University of Dallas, Franciscan University of Steubenville, De Sales University and Catholic University of America are fighting back as one private school in North Carolina is being forced to fund contraception and chemical abortion under the Obama administration's Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The EEOC ignited the First Amendment firestorm when it ruled Belmont Abbey College must include coverage for contraception in its employee health insurance plan. Hormonal contraceptives often function as abortifacients.
"People need to wake up!" said Michael Barnett, American Life League's director of leadership development and its LiveCampus college outreach program. "Under Obama, the federal government is forcing a religious institution to commit an act that violates its core values. This is religious persecution and a clear signal of what Obamacare would bring. This is the government imposing its will against the people's will."
In a letter to the Belmont, the EEOC claimed that it is discriminating against women by not covering contraceptives: "By denying prescription contraception drugs, [the college] is discriminating based on gender because only females take oral prescription contraceptives. By denying coverage, men are not affected, only women."
In a letter subsequently sent to EEOC chairman Stuart Ishimaru, Judie Brown, president of American Life League, pointed out, "The Catholic Church teaches that contraception is an evil and certainly not the sort of 'treatment' one would expect to find in a health insurance plan designed for staff at a Catholic facility. Your discriminatory actions against the college are unfounded and unconstitutional."
William K. Thierfelder, Belmont's president, affirmed that rather than provide contraceptive coverage, "We would close the college." Meanwhile, Belmont students have been excluded from the fray.
"This debate is part of an ongoing political struggle between the faculty and the administration of the school, and it entirely excludes the students and the monks of the Abbey," commented Ann Visintainer, a senior at Belmont. "We here at the Abbey pray the conflict may be resolved in a respectful and peaceful way, and in the meantime, we will continue to support and cherish human life in all its forms."
Not only are Catholic schools across the country running to the aid of Belmont, many are gearing up for First Amendment fights of their own in light of the Obama health care "reform" plan.
"This is an incursion into private religious belief," explained Larry Meo, president of De Sales University Students for Life. "The EEOC is attempting to impose a set of values on a certain group of colleges, and this is the very thing the president spoke against during his campaign."
Katie Prejean, a Crusaders for Life member at another Catholic college, the University of Dallas, agrees: "True Catholic academies are no longer safe from the Obama administration's desire to manipulate every citizen's health care, regardless of religious freedom."
Martha McAdams, a student at the University of Dallas and president of Texas Students for Life, the statewide student pro-life organization, summed up the issue at the core of the standoff between the Obama administration and Catholic institutions: "At the University of Dallas, as at most Catholic universities, abortion is purposely not included in the university-provided health insurance because it goes against a natural belief that all human life is precious."
Contact: Katie Walker - kwalker@all.org, 540.659.4942.
American Life League was cofounded in 1979 by Judie Brown. It is the largest grassroots Catholic pro-life organization in the United States and is committed to the protection of all innocent human beings from the moment of creation to natural death.
NEW YORK - Alliance Defense Fund attorneys submitted a brief in federal court Monday in response to the claim of New York's Mount Sinai Hospital that a pro-life nurse who sued the hospital has no right to defend herself in court. ADF filed suit after the hospital forced senior nurse Cathy Cenzon-DeCarlo to participate in a late-term abortion procedure.
"Pro-life nurses shouldn't be forced to assist in abortions against their beliefs. Nonetheless, Mount Sinai Hospital is multiplying its injustices against nurse Cathy Cenzon-DeCarlo," said ADF Legal Counsel Matt Bowman. "First it disregarded Cathy's conscience; now it argues she can't go to court to defend her rights. Mount Sinai Hospital does not have the right to disregard federal law and then refuse to face the consequences of its actions."
Administrators at Mount Sinai Hospital threatened Cenzon-DeCarlo with disciplinary measures 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. ADF attorneys filed suit on behalf of Cenzon-DeCarlo in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York on July 21.
Attorneys for the hospital submitted a brief to the court Aug. 10 arguing that the lawsuit should be dismissed because the federal law at issue "does not grant individual litigants a private right of action."
ADF attorneys responded to the brief Monday, noting, "Mount Sinai's compulsion violates 42 U.S.C. Â§ 300a-7(c), 'the Church Amendment' (named after Senator Frank Church). This law provides that no recipient of federal health funds may discriminate in the employment or privileges of its health care personnel because of their religious objection to abortion. The law contains no exception letting Mount Sinai compel assistance based on their unbridled judgment that abortion is an 'emergency.' Mount Sinai's actions are a quintessential example of discriminating in employment and privileges on condition that Mrs. DeCarlo violate her objection to abortion."
The ADF brief goes on to explain that "Mount Sinai compounds its contempt of the law" by denying that the law allows Cenzon-DeCarlo to defend her conscience rights. The brief points out that a federal court just this year "not only recognized an individual right, but allowed the plaintiff (in that case an abortion supporter) to seek punitive damages." It also points out that the federal law involves all of the factors that the U.S. Supreme Court has used to recognize such rights and that Congress obviously intended to protect individuals from discrimination under the law it created.
New York ADF-allied attorneys Joseph Ruta and Piero Tozzi are serving as local counsel in the case, Cenzon-DeCarlo v. The Mount Sinai Hospital. The court will hold a pre-trial conference on Sept. 10.
They knew that Cathy, who is a devoted follower of Christ and a Catholic, was on long-term record with the hospital as opposing abortion for religious reasons.
They knew that, despite what some of them were telling Cathy, the medical situation was not a true emergency, and the mother's life was not at stake.
They knew that, under federal law, any hospital receiving federal health funds - as Mount Sinai does - cannot force its employees to assist in abortion procedures under any circumstances.
Despite all that, the administrators told Cathy that if she didn't assist in the procedure, she would face disciplinary action - likely including termination and loss of her professional license.
"Pro-life nurses shouldn't be forced to assist in abortions against their beliefs," said ADF Legal Counsel Matt Bowman, who is representing Cathy in a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. "Requiring a devout, Catholic nurse to participate in a late-term abortion in order to remain employed is illegal, unethical, and violates her rights of conscience. Federal law requires that employers who receive funding from tax dollars must not compel employees to violate their sincerely held religious beliefs, but this nurse's objections fell on deaf ears."
ADF attorneys are also requesting a preliminary injunction that would order the hospital to honor Cenzon-DeCarlo's religious objection against assisting in abortion and refrain from retaliation against her while the case moves forward. New York ADF-allied attorneys Joseph Ruta and Piero Tozzi are serving as local counsel in the case.
"Chasing away workers from the health care field is disastrous health care policy," said Bowman. "An individual's conscience is likely what brought them to the health care field. Denying or coercing their conscience will likely drive them right out."
Cathy's case is a clear example of an employer violating an employee's right of conscience - and violations like this are happening all over the country everyday to people of sincere religious faith who work in the medical profession: not only nurses, but doctors and pharmacists as well. Please be in prayer for those who are trying to blend their medical skills with a Christ-like compassion and godly reverence for human life - and in particular prayer for our attorneys as they represent Cathy in this high profile and potentially nation-shaping case.
Wisconsin's bishops have called a provision in the recently enacted state budget that mandates health insurance policies cover contraceptive services as "blatantly insensitive" to the moral values of Catholics. The bishops commented on the provision in a letter to Catholics. The letter is being distributed to the state's diocesan newspapers.
This mandate takes effect early in 2010, or upon expiration of any existing contract or agreement. The mandate affects the Archdiocese of Milwaukee and the Green Bay and Madison dioceses whose employee health insurance policies are the kind that must be altered to comply with the new law when they are renewed next year. The mandate does not apply to the self-funded health insurance plans of the La Crosse and Superior dioceses.
Most states that have adopted this type of mandate include an exception for religious institutions or for certain employers. However, the provision in the Wisconsin state budget did not include such an exception.
In their letter, the bishops wrote they would continue to provide health insurance to employees as they consider their options for contesting the policy.
Diocesan leaders are assessing how to react to the mandate. WCC Executive Director John Huebscher noted that dioceses in other states with similar laws have opted to self fund their health insurance plans, but he emphasized that no diocese affected by the new law has made any decisions at this time.
"There is time to review and analyze all the options carefully and the diocesan leadership is doing just that," he said.
For more information, contact John Huebscher or Kim Wadas, 608/257-0004.
Manassas, Va. - The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has ruled that a small Catholic college must include coverage for artificial contraceptives in its employee health insurance plan, raising new concerns about the need for conscience protections and religious exemptions in America's health care policies. The Cardinal Newman Society (CNS) today sent a letter to EEOC acting chairman Stuart Ishimaru, noting that "it is ironic that the federal agency responsible for protecting against discrimination has so blatantly engaged in an inexcusable violation of religious liberty in its Belmont Abbey ruling."
CNS also is sending a letter to all Catholic bishops in the United States, informing them of the EEOC action against Belmont Abbey College and highlighting the dangerous precedent this ruling sets to force Catholic employers to included contraceptive coverage in employee health plans.
"No Catholic college or other institution should be required by government to violate the Catholic Church's clear moral teachings," said Patrick J. Reilly, President of The Cardinal Newman Society. "The apparently increasing insensitivity to religious beliefs should frighten all employers and employees. We urge religious leaders to stand in defense of Belmont Abbey College."
In December 2007, Belmont Abbey College removed coverage for abortion, contraception and voluntary sterilization after they were accidentally included in the college's insurance plan. Eight faculty members filed complaints with the EEOC and the North Carolina Department of Insurance.
"As a Roman Catholic institution, Belmont Abbey College is not able to and will not offer nor subsidize medical services that contradict the clear teaching of the Catholic Church," said Belmont Abbey President William Thierfelder. "There was no other course of action possible if we were to operate in fidelity to our mission and to our identity as a Catholic college."
The EEOC determined that Belmont Abbey has discriminated against women by denying coverage of contraception.
"By denying prescription contraception drugs, Respondent [Belmont Abbey College] is discriminating based on gender because only females take oral prescription contraceptives. By denying coverage, men are not affected, only women," wrote Reuben Daniels Jr. in his determination as the EEOC Charlotte District Office Director.
Belmont Abbey College has been directed by the EEOC to reach an agreeable resolution with faculty. If this does not happen, Daniels will advise the parties of available enforceable court alternatives.
Belmont Abbey College is included in The Newman Guide to Choosing a Catholic College for its fidelity to Catholic identity and mission. Published by CNS, The Newman Guide is now a free online resource at TheNewmanGuide.com. The next edition will be published in September 2009.
NEW YORK - Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed a lawsuit Monday against Mount Sinai Hospital on behalf of a Catholic nurse who was forced to participate in a late-term abortion under the threat of disciplinary action, including possible termination and loss of her license. The hospital has known of her religious objections to abortion since 2004.
Hospital administrators told the nurse that the scheduled abortion was an "emergency," though evidence shows otherwise, and insisted moments before the procedure that she assist doctors despite her repeated objections to the procedure, which dismembered a preborn child in the 22nd week of gestation. By federal law, hospitals that receive federal funds cannot force employees to participate in abortion procedures under any circumstances.
"Pro-life nurses shouldn't be forced to assist in abortions against their beliefs," said ADF Legal Counsel Matt Bowman. "Requiring a devout, Catholic nurse to participate in a late-term abortion in order to remain employed is illegal, unethical, and violates her rights of conscience. Federal law requires that employers who receive funding from tax dollars must not compel employees to violate their sincerely held religious beliefs, but this nurse's objections fell on deaf ears."
Administrators at Mount Sinai Hospital threatened senior nurse Cathy Cenzon-DeCarlo with disciplinary measures if she did not honor a last-minute summons to assist in a scheduled late-term abortion. Despite the fact that the patient was 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 as such.
"Category I" is the classification reserved for "patients requiring immediate surgical intervention for life or limb threatening conditions." The surgery in this case was classified as "Category II," for operations needing to take place within six hours, indicating that the hospital had no reason to insist upon Cenzon-DeCarlo's assistance in the abortion in order to protect the patient. Plenty of time existed to find a different nurse to assist, especially since evidence indicates that the patient's condition did not rise even to a Category II. In fact, Cenzon-DeCarlo observed no indications that the abortion was a medical emergency while in the operating room.
ADF attorneys filed the complaint in Cenzon-DeCarlo v. The Mount Sinai Hospital with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. They are also requesting a preliminary injunction that would order the hospital to honor Cenzon-DeCarlo's religious objection against assisting in abortion and refrain from retaliation against her while the case moves forward. New York ADF-allied attorneys Joseph Ruta and Piero Tozzi are serving as local counsel in the case.
"Since the 1973 US Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, abortion has been legal and readily accessible in the United States.
"Nevertheless, the opponents of the conscience rights laws and regulation believe health care providers should be compelled by law to provide or refer for abortion, even if doing so would violate their deepest moral convictions.
"As a practical matter, using state power to coerce health care providers to engage in conduct contrary to their consciences will diminish access to a host of medical services as health care providers committed to their moral and religious beliefs are driven from health care, and other conscientious objectors are deterred from entering the health professions in the first place.
"At issue is whether the Obama administration and Congress intend to protect the civil rights of health care providers by maintaining and enforcing the federal laws that prevent them from being compelled to perform services they find morally objectionable.
"The Administration has taken a step in the right direction by announcing it would support extending, for at least a year, an existing federal law that protects the consciences of health care providers. But doing so at the same time it proposes the elimination of regulatory protections sends a mixed signal, at best.
"If the term 'choice' means anything at all, it must apply equally to those who support abortion and those who conscientiously object to it."
SACRAMENTO, CA - California lawmakers, including Senate Minority Leader Dennis Hollingsworth and Senator George Runner, along with doctors in white coats, nurses and other healthcare professionals, said this morning on the North Steps of the Capitol that it is imperative the "conscience clause" rule is not rescinded, as President Barack Obama as indicated he will do in the near future.
The conscience clause protects those doctors, nurses and medical students who decline to perform procedures, like abortions, to which they are morally opposed. The issue of conscience rights for medical professionals is currently being decided by the Obama Administration.
How would a lack of conscience protection affect access to care in California? According a recent survey, 95% of faith-based doctors said they would stop practicing medicine if forced to choose between performing an abortion or losing their jobs. A total of 9,381,606 patients in California are cared for by 69 faith-based hospitals each year. Current projections also indicate a 200,000 physician shortage by 2025.
"In these times of budgetary crisis here in California, the regulation helps to ensure that our patients will have access to the doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals they depend on," said Dr. Darilyn Falck, an emergency medical physician in Sacramento who represented the Christian Medical Association at the press conference.
Rescinding the conscience rule will not only have adverse effects on access to treatment and care in California but will also exacerbate the budget problems in the state.
"The loss of these faith-based physicians would have a devastating impact on health care access and would disproportionately hurt the poor and medically underserved populations, where often faith-based healthcare is their only option," said Dr. Falck.
The group of doctors, under the Freedom2Care organization, also released a letter to President Barack Obama asking him to keep in place the conscience clause. Another letter went to California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, asking for his public support for the conscience clause and to join with the doctors and other healthcare professionals in asking the President to not rescind the rule.
"Many of the patients visiting faith-based hospitals, clinics and practices are uninsured or have Medicaid. Given the current crisis, in which millions of adults and children are losing coverage, California cannot afford to allow the Federal government to rescind the conscience clause. If it is rescinded, a healthcare crisis of greatest proportions would arise," reads the letter to Governor Schwarzenegger.
"If the term 'choice' means anything at all, it must apply equally to those who support abortion and those who conscientiously object to it," said William J. Cox, president of the Alliance of Catholic Health Care, in a statement released today.
NEW ORLEANS - The Louisiana Supreme Court Friday declined to hear an appeal by St. Tammany Parish Hospital in a nurse's lawsuit filed by ADF attorneys and an ADF-allied attorney. A trial judge had ruled against issuing summary judgment in favor of the hospital, so that decision will stand. The nurse, Toni Lemly, sued the hospital in 2005 after it refused to grant a reasonable accommodation for her religious beliefs.
"Pro-life medical personnel shouldn't be penalized for their beliefs," said ADF-allied attorney Brian Arabie of Lake Charles. "The hospital acted unlawfully when it refused to make a reasonable accommodation for Ms. Lemly and instead terminated her full-time position."
The lawsuit, Lemly v. St. Tammany Parish Hospital District No. 1, was filed in the 22nd Judicial District Court for the Parish of St. Tammany in June 2005. The court denied the hospital's motion for summary judgment in Januar"Toni provided St. Tammany Parish Hospital with options that would have accommodated both her full-time position and their wish to distribute the morning-after abortion pill," Arabie said. "Instead, the hospital chose to engage in discrimination based on her courageous commitment to the unborn. We are hopeful that the hospital will change course, do what's right for a dedicated nurse and her constitutional rights, and discontinue the need for any further litigation."
H.B. 517, a bill that would protect health care providers' rights of conscience, passed the Louisiana House of Representatives Tuesday and now goes to the Senate. Also awaiting Senate approval, after overwhelming approval by the House, is H.B. 340, a constitutional amendment that would protect religious liberty rights from violation by the government.
WASHINGTON, DC - President Obama gave specific attention to the "conscience clause" in yesterday's commencement speech at Notre Dame. He said he wants to "honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded not only in sound science, but also in clear ethics, as well as respect for the equality of women."
"Since present laws regarding conscience have no enforcement provision, the conscience clause is a needed regulation to protect doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals from discrimination based upon their desire to practice life medicine and decline medical procedures which are violate their conscience or ethical convictions. The President has falsely asserted that merely "educating" on the issue of conscience rights would suffice. No amount of education would have changed the discrimination against African Americans in the sixties, enforceable laws were needed.
And I doubt if the President would find it fair to force conscientious objectors to fight in a war that that they believed violated their beliefs, so why should our nation's health care professionals, on the front lines of our nation's health care crisis, be forced to violate their conscience.
"Even though President Obama said he wants to 'honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion', his actions clearly state he has no intention of doing so. You don't honor someone by forcing them to violate their conscience.
"The current regulation is reasonable and sensible and should not be repealed. When the choice of whether to violate one's conscience or leave their practice was posed to the nation's faith-based healthcare professionals, 95% of those surveyed say they will leave medicine. That's not advancing healthcare reform; that's creating a healthcare crisis. The healthcare crisis created by removing conscience protections will leave poor patients and those in medically underserved areas without the compassionate and conscientious faith-based health care they depend upon.
"So once you blow away the smokescreen of 'fair-minded' rhetoric, what remains is a radical, intolerant approach to health care that sees abortion not as a choice but a mandate. And by trashing the conscience regulation that implements existing civil rights law, the message to healthcare professionals is clear: either perform or refer for abortions or get drummed out of medicine."
"We have specifically requested a meeting with President Obama or his staff and have not received any response. If the president is truly concerned about finding common ground, he should meet with doctors and patients who would be affected by the rescission of the conscience clause, rather than spout meaningless rhetoric in name of unity."
Contact: Arina Grossu at 703-683-5004.
HELENA, MONTANA - The Christian Legal Society and Christian Medical Association asked the Montana Supreme Court yesterday to protect the conscience rights of healthcare professionals who object to assisting in suicides. In a friend of the court brief filed in Baxter v. Montana, the organizations, together comprising over 18,000 Christian medical and legal professionals, urged the Court to reverse a decision finding a state constitutional right to assisted suicide or, alternatively, asked the Court to recognize a parallel right not to participate.
"The trial court's decision to create a constitutional right to 'obtain assistance from a medical care provider in the form of obtaining a prescription for lethal drugs' threatens the rights of healthcare professionals and institutions that hold sincere ethical, moral, and religious objections to participating in the intentional killing of their patients," said Casey Mattox, litigation counsel with CLS' Center for Law & Religious Freedom. "Medical professionals should not be coerced to violate the Hippocratic Oath in order to practice in Montana."
Noting that Montana law contains no protection of the right of a medical professional not to assist in suicides, the brief urges the Court to reverse the district court's decision finding a state constitutional right, permitting the legislative process to work. The brief notes that unlike with Montana's judicially imposed "right," when Oregon and Washington created a "right to die" they explicitly protected the rights of objecting medical professionals not to participate.not to participate.
The brief explains that forcing medical professionals to assist in suicides could jeopardize Montana's healthcare system by undermining the trusting relationship between doctors and patients and making Montana the only state in the union where a physician may be compelled to help a patient kill themselves, encouraging medical professionals to seek to practice elsewhere.
"At a time when states are experiencing a healthcare shortage, making Montana the only state in the union to coerce professionals to assist in suicides could jeopardize the state's healthcare system," Mattox said.
Jeffrey Davidson and Nathan Chapman of Wilmer, Cutler, Pickering, Hale & Dorr assisted the Center for Law & Religious Freedom in drafting this brief.
The Center for Law & Religious Freedom is the advocacy division of the Christian Legal Society, a nationwide association of Christian attorneys, law students, law professors, and judges. The Center is among the most respected voices in the religious liberty arena.
(Lansing)- Earlier this year the Obama administration announced plans to rescind a recently implemented regulation that provides conscience protections for individual and institutional health care providers, and today the Michigan Catholic Conference welcomed a state Senate resolution expressing the body's opposition to the administration's plan.
"Democrats and Republicans who voted to support today's resolution are to be praised for lending their voices to a critical policy matter that affects every individual who works in and benefits from the services provided by our health care professionals and institutions," said MCC Vice President for Public Policy Paul Long.
According to Senate Resolution 43 : "The recent move by the Obama administration to rescind the conscience clause regulations jeopardizes the right of a health care professional to follow his or her personal or religious convictions. This regulation was carefully designed to safeguard against forced violations of conscience in federally funded health care programs."
The resolution goes on to state: "If conscientiously opposed individuals and institutions were forced to make a choice between performing abortions and facing punishment, they will still not perform abortions but, instead, face the punishment - whether this means loss of a job, loss of participation in a government program, or even civil or criminal penalties. This results in the provider being punished for heeding the voice of conscience."
In 2008 the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services proposed, then later implemented, a regulation enforcing three longstanding federal laws that protect individual and institutional health care providers from being forced to participate in procedures to which they have a moral or religious objection. The first law was enacted by Congress in 1973, called the Church amendment, which helps to ensure that health care personnel with moral or religious objections to abortion, sterilization or other medical or research activities are not discriminated against. The second law, called the Coats/Snowe amendment, was enacted in 1996 and forbids federal agencies, and state or local governments receiving federal funds, to discriminate against health care providers and health training programs because they do not provide abortions or abortion training. Third is the Weldon amendment, which has been included in the Labor/Health and Human Services appropriations bill every year since 2004, and forbids federal funding for government bodies which discriminate against health care providers and insurers that are not involved in abortion.
In March of this year, under the new administration, the Department of Health and Human Services began the process of rescinding the federal conscience regulation that was implemented in December 2008 to safeguard the above-mentioned laws. The public was given until April 9 to provide comment on the proposal and a final decision on the rescission of the regulation has yet to be made. Several hundred messages were sent from the Michigan Catholic Conference's grassroots advocacy tool, the Catholic Legislative Advocacy Network, in opposition to the proposed rescission. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops also invited public comments through its sister organization, the National Committee for a Human Life Amendment, and posted several videos on YouTube featuring doctors and nurses from across the country opposed to the proposal.
Threats to conscience protection have been greatly increasing in recent years as states such as New York and California have considered laws to force Catholic hospitals to provide abortions and other "services" against Catholic teaching. In Michigan, legislation that would have specifically prohibited individuals from invoking their conscience rights in the delivery of prescription medication passed out of committee last session.
"Despite the presence of federal laws, the conscience protection regulation implemented last year is necessary because some elected officials, supported by various advocacy groups, are taking radical steps to actually prohibit health care providers and individuals from invoking their right to conscience," said Long. "The presence of the conscience regulations helps to protect those workers who do not want to be forced into performing a medical procedure they find morally objectionable."
Senate Resolution 43, which passed the chamber 23-12, is sponsored by Senator Tom George (R-Kalamazoo) and will be transmitted to the Office of the President of the United States, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, and members of the Michigan congressional delegation.
WASHINGTON, DC - Representing a coalition of medical and legal professionals, attorneys for Advocates International (AI) and and the Christian Legal Society (CLS) today warned the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) against rescinding protections for healthcare professionals' freedom of conscience currently set forth in federal regulations (45 C.F.R., Part 88) as HHS proposed to do on March 10 (74 Fed. Reg. 10207).
In addition to AI and CLS, the Coalition includes the thousands of faith-based health care professionals represented by Christian Medical Association, Fellowship of Christian Physician Assistants, Christian Pharmacists Fellowship International, Heartbeat International, and CareNet.
The HHS has proposed to rescind regulations the previous administration enacted to protect freedom of conscience. The regulations prohibit federal grantees from discriminating against medical professionals and institutions for exercising their conscience rights. These victims of discrimination include doctors, physician assistants, and nurses that decline to perform or refer for abortions and medical students that do not wish to train in the performance of abortions. HHS accepted comments on the proposed rescission through midnight last night.
"Our comments let Planned Parenthood, other abortion advocates, and the states challenging these laws demonstrate with their own words that they are uninformed about their obligations as federal grantees under 35 years of conscience protection statutes," said both Sam Casey, General Counsel of Advocates International and Casey Mattox, Litigation Counsel for CLS' Center for Law & Religious Freedom.
"These regulations simply require recipients of federal funds to certify that they will obey existing federal laws barring non-discrimination against health care providers and entities who exercise their rights of conscience. Sadly, rescission is being proposed by the most abortion-friendly administration simply to make it harder for health care professionals to enforce their conscience rights to stand for life. We are asking the Obama administration to relent in their potentially unconstitutional and surely un-American proposal."
The comments also provide testimonies of discrimination against dozens of medical professionals because they refused to participate in abortions, and point to recent polls conducted by coalition member Christian Medical Association which reveal 87% of Americans believe conscience rights should be protected.
The coalition has produced evidence that over 90% of pro-life healthcare professionals would sooner leave the field than violate their conscience. This would result in reduced access to medical care, particularly for women. For further information see Freedom2Care.org.
"The abortion lobby calls this a 'midnight regulation,' but if they had their way it would be the 11th hour for conscience in the medical profession," said Casey and Mattox.
The coalition's comments and Appendix A and Appendix B to them are available as hyperlinked here.
Advocates International is an international organization of attorneys in over 150 nations who seek to do justice with compassion, including through its Global Task Forces on the Law of Life protecting the inalienable and sacred right to human life from biological conception to natural death.
Washington, DC-- The Christian Medical Association, the nation's largest association of faith-based physicians, today warned that the Obama administration's plan to scrap a conscience-protecting healthcare regulation is very unpopular and threatens to cut off patient access to healthcare professionals and institutions nationwide, especially imperiling the poor and medically underserved populations.
Speaking at the National Press Club, CMA CEO Dr. David Stevens unveiled a new national poll, commissioned by CMA and conducted by The Polling Company, Inc., that shows that 87% of American adults surveyed said it is important to "make sure that healthcare professionals in America are not forced to participate in procedures and practices to which they have moral objections."
The national telephone survey of the public also showed that 63% support the existing conscience protection regulation and 62% oppose the Obama administration's proposal to get rid of it. Public comments on Obama's proposal end April 9.
A new online poll of faith-based healthcare professionals, also conducted by The Polling Company, Inc., found that 95% of physicians agreed, "I would rather stop practicing medicine altogether than be forced to violate my conscience."
Dr. Stevens said, "Rescinding these regulations is dangerous for patients. They may soon find a sign hanging on the door of their doctor's office or hospital stating, 'Out of business--wouldn't do abortions.'" The public poll found that fully 88% of American adults surveyed said it is either "very" or "somewhat" important to them that they enjoy a similar set of morals as their doctors, nurses and other healthcare providers. Dr. Stevens noted, "Patients have a right to choose a healthcare professional who shares their moral views. No reasonable patient wants a doctor doing a procedure on them with which they are not only uncomfortable but morally opposed to.
"These regulations put teeth into the law and insure patients have the doctors and nurses they need. Removing them sends a clear message, 'It is open season on healthcare professionals of conscience. Discriminate at will.'"
CMA has organized Freedom2Care, a coalition of 35 organizations representing over five million constituents, to advance conscience protections. Individuals have used the Freedom2Care web site to send over 34,000 comments to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
CHICAGO -- Americans United for Life (AUL) today filed comments with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) supporting the retention of a December 2008 rule providing a much-needed enforcement mechanism for federal laws protecting healthcare freedom of conscience.
Dr. Charmaine Yoest, AUL President & CEO stated, "Congress has a 36-year history of passing laws to protect healthcare freedom of conscience. This rule simply provides HHS and the Administration with the means to fulfill their sworn constitutional duty to properly enforce these laws."
On March 10, 2009 , HHS announced its intention to rescind the rule enacted in the final months of the Bush Administration. The rule is opposed by pro-abortion groups, who included a demand for its repeal in a 55-page memorandum to the Obama Transition Team in December 2008--arguing it limits access to the full range of reproductive healthcare.
AUL Vice President of Legal Affairs Denise Burke remarked, "Comprehensive conscience protections and proper enforcement of existing federal laws will help ensure access to quality medical care for all Americans."
Burke continued, "While the majority of federal conscience laws are intended to protect those who decline to participate in abortions, some also protect those who choose to perform them. It is, therefore, incredibly short-sighted for abortion advocates to actively lobby against the enforcement of these protections."
Washington, D.C. - Liberty Counsel has filed a public comment with the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) opposing President Barack Obama's proposed repeal of the Provider Conscience Regulation (73 Fed. Reg. 50,274). If the regulation is repealed, then healthcare providers could be forced to participate in abortions and other ethically controversial practices in violation of their moral or religious beliefs at the risk of losing their jobs or board certifications.
The purpose of the Conscience Regulation is to protect healthcare providers from invidious discrimination when they rely upon their moral or religious beliefs, particularly when confronted with a request to perform an abortion. The idea of a conscience regulation is not new. The Conscience Regulation merely makes healthcare providers aware of their rights, enforces already-existing federal laws, and gives healthcare providers a remedy when they face discrimination based upon their moral or religious beliefs.
The Conscience Regulation is vitally important to any healthcare provider who feels compelled not to perform abortions or refer patients to receive abortions. Without the Regulation, healthcare providers will be forced to either perform abortions or leave the medical field. Overturning the Regulation will also have the effect of worsening existing healthcare shortages and robbing women of the ability to choose pro-life healthcare.
Repealing the Conscience Regulation will affect not only individual healthcare providers, but also many religiously affiliated hospitals. A number of Roman Catholic bishops have threatened to engage in civil disobedience or to close healthcare facilities rather than perform abortions. Other religiously affiliated hospitals may likewise cease operations. Thus, repealing the Conscience Regulation would have a negative impact on the provision of healthcare even beyond the realm of abortion. No person should be forced to be involved in medical practices that go against the strong dictates of conscience.
Thomas Jefferson once said, "No provision in our Constitution ought to be dearer to man than that which protects the rights of conscience against the enterprises of the civil authority."
Mathew D. Staver, Founder of Liberty Counsel and Dean of Liberty University School of Law, commented: "Protecting conscience from the heavy hand of the law is the very essence of liberty. Rather than reducing abortion or the so-called culture war, President Barack Obama has funded abortion and now seeks to force conscientious objectors to participate in abortion. If we fail to protect healthcare providers, the consequences will be far reaching. When civil government tramples upon a person's conscience, tyranny cannot be far away."
WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), focusing on constitutional law, said today it's pleased with an important victory in its ongoing litigation to protect the conscience rights of pharmacists in the State of Illinois. On Friday, April 3, 2009, the Circuit Court in Springfield, Illinois issued a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) against the Governor of Illinois and other state officials, ordering them not to enforce a 2005 administrative regulation that required all pharmacies to dispense Plan B and other forms of abortion producing drugs.
"This is yet another step on the road to full protection for the rights of conscience of all health care workers," said Francis J. Manion, ACLJ Senior Counsel who argued the motion for the TRO on behalf of the pharmacists. "In ruling in favor of our clients, the court rejected the attempt of Illinois officials to trample on the rights of our clients and disregard existing laws passed by the legislature for the very purpose of protecting those rights. We will continue to press this issue until we have obtained full protection for the conscience rights of these professionals who should not have to choose between their deeply held religious beliefs and license revocation and other penalties."
In issuing the Order, Judge John Belz found that the regulation posed a real threat of irreparable harm to pharmacists with religious objections to selling such drugs and that the ACLJ's clients -- Luke VanderBleek and Glenn Kosirog -- two pharmacists who own five pharmacies between them -- were "likely to succeed" on the merits of their claim that the regulation violates the Illinois Health Care Right of Conscience Act. A hearing on the pharmacists' request for a permanent injunction will be held sometime in June.
This case is one of a number of lawsuits the ACLJ has been involved in Illinois since 2005 when then-Governor Rod Blagojevich, at the urging of Planned Parenthood, NARAL and other pro-abortion groups, issued an Executive Order that targeted pro-life pharmacists who objected to dispensing abortion causing drugs.
In Menges v. Blagojevich, et al., the ACLJ represented seven individual pharmacists who succeeded in having the state amend the regulation to recognize the conscience rights of individual pharmacists. In Vandersand v. Walmart and Quayle, et al. v. Walgreens, the ACLJ convinced two other courts that Illinois pharmacists are protected by the State's Health Care Right of Conscience Act. The current case, Morr-Fitz et al. v. Blagojevich, et al., seeks to ensure that pro-life pharmacy owners -- not just individual pharmacists -- receive the legal protection to which they are entitled under state laws as well as the U.S. Constitution. The ACLJ is co-counsel in the Morr-Fitz case with Mark Rienzi of Wilmer Hale in Washington, D.C.
"All the conscience laws in the world will only be effective if those whose rights are endangered are ready to fight attempts by government and private entities to ignore them," said Manion. "We will continue to fight for pro-life health care workers to ensure that existing laws have the teeth in them needed to be effective."
This legal victory comes as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services continues to solicit public comment on President Obama's plan to rescind Conscience Clause protections at the federal level that have been in place to protect the rights of pro-life medical personnel. The ACLJ has heard from more than 200,000 Americans urging President Obama to reconsider and keep the Conscience Clause protections in place. The HHS public comment period ends this week.
The ACLJ has been and remains at the forefront of litigation to protect the religious freedom and conscience rights of health care professionals.
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) - U.S. Senator Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-OK), a practicing physicians who has delivered more than 4,000 babies, offered an amendment to the 2010 budget resolution to ensure that funds made available through the budget's $634 billion health care reserve fund will not be used to violate the conscience of health care providers or coerce patients into seeing pre-selected doctors or enroll in a particular health care plan.
The amendment was an effort to preserve the conscience protection rule which guarantees the freedom of health care providers, including physicians, hospitals and insurance providers, to serve the public without violating their moral and religious convictions. The Obama administration has taken steps to rescind the rule. The amendment failed by a vote of 41 to 56.
"Like many pro-life doctors, I would go to jail before being forced to perform procedures, such as abortion, that violate my deepest held convictions. Medical ethics is based on the principle of 'First, do no harm.' I will fight to protect this Constitutional right as a physician and as a senator. Discriminating against health care providers by requiring them to disregard their deeply held beliefs is assault on liberty," Dr. Coburn said.
More background on Dr. Coburn's conscience clause amendment is available here.
SACRAMENTO, Calif., Apr 01, 2009 -- The Alliance of Catholic Health Care is asking the Obama Administration to stop efforts to repeal federal conscience clause protection for hospitals and health care workers and keep in place the existing regulation, citing the need to enforce civil rights laws and protect religious freedom.
"The conscience protections contained in federal law are a civil right for all hospitals and health care workers," said William J. Cox, president and CEO of the Alliance of Catholic Health Care. "The regulation that the Administration seeks to repeal is necessary for preserving those rights and making sure that health care workers can perform their duties without fear or intimidation."
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued the "Provider Conscience Regulation" (73 Fed. Reg. 78072) not only to enforce existing federal conscience rights laws, but also to fulfill the Executive Branch's constitutional duty to ensure all laws are faithfully executed.
-- Establish regulatory enforcement measures to ensure compliance with the statutes.
The regulation is similar to other HHS regulations that raise awareness of and enforce other important federal civil rights laws. For example, under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, when an entity elects to receive any amount of federal funds, that entity certifies that it will follow all federal conditions and rules that apply to the use of those funds.
In a similar manner, the HHS "Provider Conscience Regulation" coordinates and incorporates the various statutory requirements related to conscience rights, allows for greater clarity and awareness of the statutory protections, greater ease of administration, and a uniform mechanism for investigating complaints, resulting in greater compliance with the law.
The regulation and the federal laws on which it is based are consistent with the U.S. Supreme Court's acknowledgement in Roe v Wade of the right of physicians, hospitals, and other health care providers not to be discriminated against on the basis of their moral convictions against performing or facilitating abortion.
"Our members provide health care services in accordance with the religious and moral tenets of the Catholic faith," said Cox. "Central to these beliefs is a firm commitment to the dignity of the human person from conception to natural death and a deep concern for the health care needs of the poor and for those in spiritual need.
"We do not impose our religious or moral beliefs on the people and families we serve," continued Cox, "but we do hold ourselves accountable, as health care providers, to Catholic ethical and moral standards."
When HHS promulgated the regulations last year, they considered the regulations necessary because certain provisions of various federal laws - the Church Amendments (42 USC 300a-7), the Coats-Snowe Amendment (42 USC 238n, the Public Health Service Act), and the Weldon Amendment (PL 110-161) - that would otherwise prevent discrimination against hospitals and health care workers were being ignored or overlooked. As a result, pressure has repeatedly been brought to bear through state legislation, licensing or certification authorities and professional boards to coerce individual and institutional health care providers into violating their consciences by forcing them, under penalty of law, to conduct, refer for or receive training in the performance of abortions.
"Repealing this regulation will send a clear message that the government considers these civil rights unimportant and all but invite new instances of discrimination," said Cox. "We urge the Obama Administration to retain the 'Provider Conscience Regulation' in its current form."
The Obama administration has directed the Department of Health and Human Services to revoke a protection of conscience regulation. The regulation, finalized in December, 2009, has raised awareness of existing federal protection of conscience laws. It has also strengthened them by providing recourse for conscientious objectors who have been the victims of discrimination.
As a first step in revoking this protection, the Department is accepting comment from the American public for a thirty day period that will end 9 April, 2009.
A website has been set up by Freedom2Care.org to allow Americans who support freedom of conscience in health care to register their comments through a portal to HHS. Visitors can make use of 1) a prewritten comment crafted for healthcare providers, 2) a prewritten comment for patients, or 3) the option of writing a personal comment.
Freedom2Care.org is also collecting stories of discrimination to demonstrate the need for protection of conscience legislation and the importance of the existing HHS rule. Visitors can ask that their stories or comments be forwarded to lawyers who perform pro-bono work.
The Protection of Conscience Project supports the efforts of Freedom2Care.org and applauds its advocacy of freedom of conscience for health care workers.
WASHINGTON-The Obama Administration has a constitutional duty to enforce laws protecting religious freedom and the right of conscience, according to comments by Anthony Picarello and Michael Moses of the Office of General Counsel of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).
The comments were filed with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) March 23 in response to the proposed rescinding of an HHS regulation protecting the conscience rights of health care professionals.
Picarello and Moses cited the numerous laws enacted by Congress over thirty-five years-including the Church Amendment, the Coats-Snowe Amendment and the Weldon Amendment-aimed at protecting health care providers and professionals from being coerced into participating in abortions and emphasized the constitutional duty of the executive branch to "take care that the laws be faithfully executed," and to avoid contradicting or undercutting those laws.
The need for enforcement of these laws is also evident in the "growing hostility on the part of some professional organizations and advocacy groups to rights of conscience in health care," Picarello and Moses noted. They listed examples of recent statements and reports by the American Civil Liberties Union, NARAL Pro-Choice America and Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health, and even state and local governments that were hostile toward conscience rights.
"Because the Administration holds itself out as one committed to a policy of 'choice' regarding abortion, the Administration cannot, consistent with that policy, remove the choice of nurses, doctors, clinics, or hospitals not to provide or facilitate abortions," Picarello and Moses said. They added that removing conscience protections for the purpose of increasing access to abortion would also be inconsistent with the stated policy of the Obama Administration to reduce the number of abortions.
The USCCB's comments can be found in full online.
CINCINNACINCINNATI, March 2009 - A recent commentary concludes that pharmacists require freedom of conscience in order to provide the best patient care. "The 'Hijacking' of Moral Conscience from Pharmacy Practice: A Canadian Perspective" by pharmacist and ethicist Cristina Alarcon, clinical instructor at the University of British Columbia, is available online from The Annals of Pharmacotherapy and will appear in the April 2009 issue. The article's release coincides with recent plans to remove a federal rule that clarifies and protects US healthcare workers' conscience rights.
In the wake of ongoing medical developments, pharmacists increasingly face involvement with controversial procedures such as assisted suicide and abortion. Laws, policies, and professional guidelines exist to promote professional integrity. Yet some can require pharmacists to provide services contrary to their ethical beliefs, potentially interfering with their professional judgment and their abilities to provide patient care with integrity and a full sense of responsibility.
AlthoughAlthough written from the perspective of Canadian laws and practice standards, the article applies to healthcare workers in all settings. Arguing that conscience rights are neither arbitrary nor subject to removal, Alarcon explains they are a natural and necessary part of all public life.
"Protection of conscience is crucial if we are to foster a society where citizens are free to dissent from popular opinion," she explains. "This is especially true in modern Western democracies, where the concept of majority rule can lead to the mistaken notion that 'might' makes 'right'."
The Annals of Pharmacotherapy now in its 43rd year of publication, is a leading peer-reviewed, international pharmacotherapy journal for physicians, pharmacists, and other healthcare practitioners.
WASHINGTON-Cardinal Francis George is urging Catholics in the United States to tell the Obama Administration to retain Health and Human Services regulations governing conscience protections for health care workers.
This is vital to keep the government from "moving our country from democracy to despotism," said Cardinal George, President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. He delivered the message via video available on the Web at and on YouTube.
Those who want to protect conscience rights can speak out through an "action alert".
"Respect for personal conscience and freedom of religion as such ensures our basic freedom from government oppression. No government should come between an individual person and God-that's what America is supposed to be about," Cardinal Francis George said. "This is the true common ground for us as Americans. We therefore need legal protection for freedom of conscience and of religion-including freedom for religious health care institutions to be true to themselves."
"I ask you please to let the government know that you want conscience protections to remain strongly in place. In particular, let the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington know that you stand for the protection of conscience, especially now for those who provide the health care services so necessary for a good society," he said.
Alberta pharmacists may be forced to "enhance access" to euthanasia, assisted suicide, post-coital interception, etc. and other morally controversial services if a new pharmacy Code of Ethics is adopted. Even pharmacists with strong ethical or religious objections may be compelled to refer or otherwise facilitate patient access to such services.
The criticism of the Alberta College of Pharmacists Draft Code of Ethics is made in a submission to the College by the Protection of Conscience Project.
"To impose this requirement," the submission warns, " would effectively close the profession of pharmacy to anyone who finds such conduct morally unacceptable."
The Project argues that an objecting pharmacist should not be charged for professional misconduct for refusing to refer patients or assist them in obtaining euthanasia, assisted suicide, post-coital interception, etc. Instead, the submission asks the College to institute "an unambiguous policy of accommodating freedom of conscience."
LANSDOWNE, VA - Care Net President Melinda Delahoyde responded to news Friday that President Obama has directed the Department of Health and Human Services to overturn regulations that protect medical professionals from being forced to perform or refer for abortion. "Our nation's physicians, nurses, and other healthcare providers have the right to practice medicine without violating their conscience. To remove these protections is to ultimately remove these individuals of integrity from the field of medicine entirely," Delahoyde said. "That's not an action that we as Americans should be willing to accept."
Delahoyde said that her network of 1,160 pregnancy center affiliates will feel the damaging blow of this action, if implemented. "Pregnancy centers empower women facing unplanned pregnancy to choose abortion alternatives," Delahoyde said. "To accomplish this, we offer critical, free medical services, such as limited obstetrical ultrasounds and STD testing. Because of our commitment to providing alternatives to abortion, we rely on the availability of pro-life medical professionals - nurses, OB-GYNs, nurse practitioners, sonographers, and others. If the rights of these individuals are violated, then they will simply leave the field of practice or not enter it altogether. With more than 470 pregnancy centers in the Care Net network that offer medical services, we're simply not willing to take that risk."
Care Net will be mobilizing its network and supporters to provide comment to the Department of Health and Human Services on the Administration's proposal to overturn the regulations. In addition, Care Net has filed as an intervenor in a lawsuit filed by state attorney generals and Planned Parenthood that challenges the federal regulations protecting the right of conscience.
available on the Care Net website.
For interviews with Melinda Delahoyde or Dr. Sandy Christiansen, contact the Care Net press office.
Washington D.C. - - Today, the Family Research Council (FRC) responded to President Obama's expected action to stop the implementation of regulations to enforce the Church, Coats, and Weldon Amendments that protect health care providers' right of conscience. These regulations would have increased public awareness of, and ensured governmental enforcement of, these vital statutes.
"For President Obama to do this would be a huge blow to religious freedom and First Amendment rights. No one should be forced to have an abortion, and no one should be forced to be an abortionist in violation of their religious or ethical convictions. However, President Obama intends to stop regulations to enforce conscience protection statutes. In doing so, he will open the door to discrimination against the choice of healthcare workers who do not want to be complicit in abortion or other controversial practices. These regulations would have ensured that healthcare workers are not forced to participate in the performance or promotion of abortion against their will.
"Despite current law that has protected conscience rights for over 30 years, the lack of regulations resulted in confusion and a lack of awareness within the health care community, leaving health care personnel vulnerable to discrimination and forcing them to drop their specialties at a crucial time of health care scarcity. Protecting the right of all health care providers to make professional judgments based on moral convictions and ethical standards is foundational to federal law and is necessary to ensure that access to healthcare is not diminished, which will occur if healthcare workers are forced out of their jobs because of their ethical stances. President Obama's intention to change the language of these protections would result in the government becoming the conscience and not the individual. It is a person's right to exercise their moral judgment, not the government's to decide it for them.
"It is unfortunate that President Obama is planning to bow down to pro-abortion forces and stop enforcement of laws enacted to protect the choice of healthcare providers not to participate in abortion or other controversial practices. Family Research Council urges President Obama to change course and defend the conscience laws for healthcare workers by keeping these much-needed regulations in place."
"The move to rescind the healthcare provider conscience regulation imperils women's healthcare access, threatens healthcare professionals' freedom to practice medicine according to ethical standards, and exposes the myth of moderation in Obama's abortion policy.
"The Obama administration claims, without offering a shred of statistical evidence, that the regulation has 'created confusion' and will somehow hinder access to healthcare. What can be clearer than not using federal funds to force healthcare professionals to violate longstanding principles of medical ethics like the Hippocratic Oath, which guided medicine for over two millennia? The real threat to healthcare access is driving out every healthcare professional who conscientiously practices medicine according to life-affirming ethical standards.
"Thousands of conscientious and compassionate physicians, nurses, hospitals and clinics currently serve poor women and those who live in medically underserved areas. Many of these professionals and institutions are motivated and guided by longstanding Hippocratic ethics and biblical principles that preclude participation in abortion and other controversial procedures. Infringing on their right to practice medicine according to these life-affirming ethical standards will force them to leave the profession and to shut down the hospitals and clinics.
"An informal survey of our members showed that over 40 percent report being pressured to violate ethical standards. Physicians report losing positions and promotions because of their life-affirming views. Residents report losing training privileges because they refused to do abortions. Medical students report changing career tracks away from obstetrics for fear of pressure to do abortions. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has officially asserted that it expects every obstetrician to participate in abortions, either through procedure or referral.
"We hear a lot of rhetoric from abortion advocates about the government not interfering with the physician-patient relationship. Why is this argument no longer employed when the physician and the patient disagree with abortion on demand? It would appear that for all the abortion "choice" rhetoric, "choice" is really a one-way street. When it comes to pro-life individuals, abortion choice quickly turns into abortion mandate.
"President Obama and other abortion advocates would like to maintain the myth of their moderation on abortion, talking much about 'reducing the need for abortion.' Yet they have no tolerance for moderate abortion policies like informing parents when their children seek an abortion, banning the essentially infanticidal partial-birth abortions, or protecting the civil rights of healthcare professionals who follow the Hippocratic Oath.
"This latest move against pro-life principles in healthcare comes on the heels of Obama's recent lifting of the Mexico City policy, which now lets taxpayer funds prop up abortion groups, and his declaration that he will fund the UNFPA-the United Nations population program found by the U.S. State Department to aid and abet China's coercive abortion policy. These policy moves indicate with increasing clarity what a radically pro-abortion agenda this administration intends to impose."
HARTFORDHARTFORD, Conn., Feb. 3 /Christian Newswire Representing Concerned Women for America, America's largest women's advocacy group and four other groups of pro-life medical professionals, attorneys with Advocates International filed a motion to intervene yesterday in three lawsuits commenced on January 15 that seek to invalidate a federal law protecting medical professionals from discrimination because they refuse to participate in abortions. Advocates International is seeking to defend the law against challenges by some state officials, Planned Parenthood, and the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union.
"As"As we face the most pro-abortion Congress and administration in American history, medical professionals can no longer depend on government to protect their rights not to be forced to perform abortions against their conscience. Despite the well-established laws protecting the health care right of conscience, Planned Parenthood, the ACLU, and their pro-abortion allies are now hoping for the cooperation of the Obama administration as they again seek to punish pro-life medical professionals for their beliefs," said Samuel B. Casey, General Counsel of Advocates International's Law of Life Project. "Our clients are opposing these lawsuits because they wrongfully seek to compel health care workers to perform abortions against their ethical and professional judgment or face dire consequences."
Concerned Woman for America (CWA), Christian Pharmacists Fellowship International, Care Net, Heartbeat International and the New Jersey Physicians Resource Council, Advocates International attorneys, are asking to be allowed to intervene and defend the law, 45 CFR Part 88, enacted in December 2008 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Noting a pattern of grant recipients unaware of or flouting existing laws protecting medical professionals' rights of conscience, HHS enacted the new law to require grantees to certify compliance with them in order to receive funds. The three long-standing statutes are the Church Amendment, the Coats-Snowe Amendment, and the Weldon Amendment.
Last week, The Christian Medical Association, Catholic Medical Association, and American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, represented by attorneys from the Alliance Defense Fund and Christian Legal Society also intervened and asked the court to be allowed to defend the law.
Doctors forced to perform abortions or else?
HARTFORD, Conn. - Attorneys with the Christian Legal Society and the Alliance Defense Fund filed motions to intervene Wednesday in three lawsuits that seek to invalidate a federal law protecting medical professionals from discrimination because they refuse to participate in abortions. Three pro-life medical associations are seeking to defend the law against challenges by some state officials, Planned Parenthood, and the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union.
"Medical professionals should not be forced to perform abortions against their conscience. Planned Parenthood, the ACLU, and their pro-abortion allies are seeking to punish pro-life medical professionals for their beliefs," said Litigation Counsel Casey Mattox with CLS's Center for Law & Religious Freedom. "Far from arguing for 'choice,' these lawsuits seek to compel health care workers to perform abortions or face dire consequences."
"For over three decades, federal law has prohibited recipients of federal grants from forcing medical professionals to participate in abortions. The arguments in the lawsuits themselves demonstrate lack of compliance with these laws and the necessity of the regulation they are challenging," said ADF Legal Counsel Matt Bowman. Attorney Andrew Knott of Cheshire is assisting as local counsel.
The Christian Medical Association, Catholic Medical Association, and American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, represented by CLS and ADF attorneys, are asking to be allowed to defend the law, 45 CFR Part 88, enacted in December 2008 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Noting a pattern of grant recipients unaware of or flouting existing laws protecting medical professionals' rights of conscience, HHS enacted the new law to require grantees to certify compliance with them in order to receive funds. The three long-standing statutes are the Church Amendment, the Coats-Snowe Amendment, and the Weldon Amendment.
The three pro-life medical groups point out that denying rights of conscience could harm access to healthcare for all by forcing medical professionals who refuse to perform abortions to either relocate from jurisdictions that force them to do so or leave the profession altogether.
Many of those challenging the HHS law failed in previous efforts to have the Weldon Amendment struck down. CLS and ADF attorneys representing the Christian Medical Association and American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists successfully defended that law (http://ww.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=4432, http://ww.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=3918, and http://ww.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=3542).
The briefs in support of the motions to intervene in Connecticut v. United States, National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association v. Leavitt, and Planned Parenthood of America v. Leavitt filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut are available at http://ww.telladf.org/UserDocs/HHSinterventions.pdf.
ADF is a legal alliance of Christian attorneys and like-minded organizations defending the right of people to freely live out their faith. The CLS Center for Law & Religious Freedom is a team of Christian attorneys allied with ADF to defend religious liberty and human life.

References: v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.