Posted by
Playful Walrus on Tuesday, August 26, 2008 1:23:05 PM
Was the California Supreme Court, which is apparently unable to tell the difference between men and women, right when it ordered that doctors should have to perform elective procedures even when the result would violate their conscience?
I’ve already discussed this issue before here and here. Recently, Richard P. Sloan, a professor of behavioral medicine at Columbia University Medical Center, had his commentary run in the Los Angeles Times.
Earlier this week, the California Supreme Court ruled against two physicians who allegedly denied -- based on their religious opposition -- a legal medical treatment to a patient based on her sexual orientation.
That is not accurate. They did not want to use donated sperm from some stranger to help a woman get pregnant when she was unmarried, because any child resulting from their work would have no father in her life. Yes, fathers die or whatever, but that is different from intentionally depriving a child of a father.
This is a welcome, if unusual, turnabout in a disturbing trend that has characterized American medicine over the last three or so decades: an increasing willingness to allow the actions of individuals to disadvantage, and even endanger, others if those actions derive from religious faith.
The doctors were not placing the woman at a disadvantage and they certainly weren’t endangering her.
This summer, a "pharmacy for life" was set to open in the suburbs of Washington. Like other similar pharmacies, it won't stock condoms, contraceptives or the so-called morning-after contraceptive Plan B, despite the fact that pharmacies are licensed by state governments giving them the exclusive right to dispense medications.
Uh, yeah, but the state government does not prevent other pharmacies from being opened, including online.
In exchange for these monopoly rights, pharmacists have an ethical obligation to act in the interests of patients.
It’s not a monopoly. And these doctors figured they were acting in the interest of patients, especially children.
Recent studies have shown that 14% of U.S. doctors, when confronted by possibly objectionable but legal medical treatments, not only would refuse to deliver such care but also would refuse to inform their patients about it or refer them to physicians who would deliver the care.
That means that 86% of U.S. doctors either would deliver the care or refer patients to someone who would. So what is the problem? You know, a Hindu restaurant should not be required to tell me about a place down the street that sells beef, even though they are inspected by the county. I am free to seek that out on my own.
That translates to about 40 million people who would receive substandard care from these physicians, who believe that their religious convictions are more important than the well-being of their patients.
Again, this is not about the well-being of their patients, but why is it bad that someone considers their relationship with God more important than anything else? Only someone who doesn’t take God seriously would word things they way you did. Don't force your unbelief on the rest of us.
The tradition of religious freedom in the United States is one of the founding ideals of this country.
As is freedom of association and free enterprise.
But as our framers envisioned it, religious freedom referred to a right to practice one's own religion free of interference from others. It did not refer to religiously based interference with the rights of others, who may have their own and different religious traditions.
Yes, and the state should not be interfering with the religion of the doctors.
So it's time to say "enough." In the United States, we all are free to practice our religion as we see fit, as long as we do not interfere with the well-being of others by imposing our religious views on them.
Again, this was an elective and selfish procedure, not about “well being”. But I get what you mean. We’re free to practice our religion as long as we don’t practice it outside of our closets.
Now, I realize that doctors are licensed by the state. But if there’s anything the California Supreme Court has taught us, it is that people have a right to state-issued licenses. So the doctors should be able to refuse those elective procedures and keep their licenses.