Nice to see O'Bama working on getting rid of midnight Bush rules

[kandrathe]

The Hippocratic oath says, "do no harm," but when a provider refuses to give services to prevent someone from being harmed, they've broken their oath, and if I'm not mistaken, broken part of their license to practice medicine.

Yes, as Pete describes, they are caught on the horns of a dilemma. There is a procedure they cannot in good conscience recommend. Why? Because they consider the human embryo as also a living being, and that the doctor now has two patients. What is good for one (or her bank account mostly), will be lethal to the other. The reality is that this is a pressure tactic of the "pro-abortion" lobby who want to have those doctors who object to abortion drummed out of practice. I found on consciencelaws.org a good description of the vagueness of the current situation within the UK, the US, Canada, and other parts of the world. (in the US, the 1973 Church Amendment gave hospitals, clinics, doctors and nurses the right to not participate in any procedure that was against their conscience.)

"There is widespread confusion about the extent of the conscientious objection clause in the Abortion Act 1967. Section 4(1) reads: ‘Subject to subsection (2) of this section, no person shall be under any duty, whether by contract or by any statutory or other legal requirement, to participate in any treatment authorized by this Act to which he has a conscientious objection….’ Subsection (2) relates to treatment ‘necessary to save the life or to prevent grave permanent injury to the physical or mental health of a pregnant women.’"

On their main site they sum up the situation thusly; Influential academics and professionals have begun to suggest that physicians who object to euthanasia are, nonetheless, obliged to refer patients for the service [Mandatory Referral]. More and more often comes the ultimatum: "Do what you're told, or get another job."

The 2008 Weldon amendment extends this guarantee of conscience by withholding federal funding for any institution that does discriminate against these medical peoples decisions of conscience. For example, even Catholic hospitals, who have a long standing moral aversion to abortion are being pressured by health care conglomerates to fall in line and do whatever they are told. The ACLU writes, "When . . . religiously affiliated organizations move into secular pursuits– such as providing medical care or social services to the public or running a business – they should no longer be insulated from secular laws. In the public world, they should play by public rules." ACLU, "Religious Refusals and Reproductive Rights," January 2002, page 11. Which is ironic, since many of the world's oldest hospital's (e.g. St Bartholomew's Hospital, founded in 1123.) were formed as benevolent religious care giving institutions. One would think that the ACLU would also value the civil liberty of not being forced to violate your own conscience. What about State sanctioned executions? If the government orders a doctor to administer the cocktail of death, are they obliged to kill for the government? There are currently lawsuits in California against doctors who refused embryo implants for single welfare women who were able to save enough to pay for the procedure. At what point does the doctor just become the amoral prostitute of medicine?

I think that with most professions there are lines which you may not cross. For example, in software engineering, I would not want to be involved in designing the logic in anti-personnel mines. In trucking, you might imagine there are people who wouldn't want to transport hazardous waste, or explosives. A lawyer can choose to become a defense attorney, and even then which clients they might serve. It means that some doors are shut for those people of conscience, and the same is true in the medical profession. If you object to too many things, you probably would not earn as good a living as that person who would do anything.