New Bush Rule: Doctors Can Refuse To Give Women Abortions

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration on Thursday proposed stronger job protections for doctors and other health care workers who refuse to participate in abortions because of religious or moral objections.

Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said that health care professionals should not face retaliation from employers or from medical societies because they object to abortion.

"Freedom of conscience is not to be surrendered upon issuance of a medical degree," said Leavitt. "This nation was built on a foundation of free speech. The first principle of free speech is protected conscience."

The proposed rule, which applies to institutions receiving government money, would require as many as 584,000 employers ranging from major hospitals to doctors' offices and nursing homes to certify in writing that they are complying with several federal laws that protect the conscience rights of health care workers. Violations could lead to a loss of government funding and legal action to recoup federal money already paid.

Abortion foes called it a victory for the First Amendment, but abortion rights supporters said they feared the rule could stretch the definition of abortion to include birth control, and served notice that they intend to challenge the administration.

"Women's ability to manage their own health care is at risk of being compromised by politics and ideology," Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said in a statement.

Abortion rights groups had complained that earlier drafts contained vague language that might block access to birth control, and they said the latest version has not addressed all of their concerns.

The rule "fails to give assurances that current laws about abortion will not be stretched to cover birth control," said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America.

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But Tony Perkins, president of the conservative Family Research Council, said it upholds basic constitutional freedoms.

"This proposal ensures that doctors and other medical personnel will retain the constitutional right to listen to their own conscience when it comes to performing or participating in an abortion," Perkins said. "These regulations will ensure that pro-life medical personnel will not be forced to engage in the unconscionable killing of innocent human life."

Leavitt said the regulation was intended to protect practitioners who have moral objections to abortion and sterilization, and would not interfere with patients' ability to get birth control or any legal medical procedure.

"Nothing in the new regulation in any way changes a patient's right to any legal procedure," he said, noting that a patient could go to another provider.

"This regulation is not about contraception," Leavitt added. "It's about abortion and conscience. It is very closely focused on abortion and physician's conscience."

The 42-page rule seeks to set up a system for enforcing conscience protections in three separate federal laws, the earliest of which dates to the 1970s. In some cases, the laws aim to protect both providers who refuse to take part in abortions and those who do.

The regulation is written to apply to a broad swath of the health care work force, not doctors alone. Accordingly, an employee whose task it is to clean the instruments used in a particular procedure would be covered. Also covered would be volunteers and trainees.

The underlying laws deal mainly with abortion and sterilization, but both the laws and the language of the rule seem to recognize that objections on conscience grounds could involve other types of services.

"This regulation does not limit patient access to health care, but rather protects any individual health care provider or institution from being compelled to participate in, or from being punished for refusal to participate in, a service that, for example, violates their conscience," the rule said.

Planned Parenthood attorney Roger Evans said that a key legal problem with the rule is that it fails to define what constitutes an abortion, and thereby could be stretched to cover other types of services. But Leavitt said existing laws adequately define abortion.

The regulation now faces a 30-day public comment period.

Comments

[billu]

My wife and I are pregnant. She was unhappy with her OB so she chose a new one. She picked a Catholic Pro-Life practice, fortunately our state law enables this. Our position is that we want a doctor who will do everything possible for our child. There is a market for such services. My only criticisim of the rule would be that such doctors much get a signed release from the patient acknowledging their position so that there are no suprises.

Some docs want to be GYNs others want to be OBs and still others want to be both. A doctor should never be forced by law to do any procedure much less one that violates their conscience.

[lornejl]

What if they refuse to render medical care to a Muslim, or an African American, or a gay/lesbian. Think before you post.

[who38]

Sounds like he is from Alabama; they have a history of refusing to render medical aid to black people.

[luziannagirl]

Congratulations, billu!

Tell us, though, if you believe that human life begins at conception, as I am assuming you do, what would y'all do in the unfortunate circumstance of :

A deadly and doomed tubal/ectopic pregnancy?

100% certainty the baby will be born with a deadly genetic defect and won't live more than a few months or years?

Severe mental impairment?

Pregnancy as the result of rape, incest, or torture?

These are horrible thoughts, even obscene thoughts perhaps unthinkable to people experiencing the joy of a planned pregnancy, but they are unfortunate realities for thousands and millions of girls, women, couples, and families.

A lot of them never thought they'd be in such a predicament.

Can you see where further restriction of womens' access to legal abortion and further curtailment of doctors' ability to practice medicine as they see fit (via increased peer and professional pressure) adds to human misery rather than alleviates it?

[who38]

Never mind all that; certainly no anti-abortionist has.

[wolfgangmo]

I agree completely, however if it is part of the responsibilities of job they hold, then they should feel free to look elsewhere for employment and sooth their consciences at another location.

I haven't heard anyone here advocating holding a gun to any Docs head..

Your argument is a straw man.

[who38]

The doctors aren't the major problem. It is the nurses, hospitals, etc., ....those people behind the scenes that cause more problems. I know my doctors, and can ask them about their intention up front, not so, with the lab techs, OR nurses and hospital administrators.

[gotborked]

Not a gun to there head, but their job over their head.

[wolfgangmo]

No doc is being forced to do anything . Your argument is pure BS, even if you are unaware.

If you don't like the job, don't take it. If you do take it, then do the job. Or are you arguing that Docs should not be held to the same standard as any other working joe?

[MrsGreebers]

You wife is pregnant. You aren't. (I just hate the "we're" pregnant construction.) Congrats to both of you, BTW. And I fully support your wife's right to make her own healthcare decisions, including instructing the doctor to let her die instead of the child should it come to that. That is the entire point.

But that aside, with all due respect, the practice of medicine is a privilege, not a right. I don't understand why there is perceived to be a "right" to have a job without having to perform the job. This applies more to pharmacists. Before Plan B become OTC, there were pharmacists who not only would refuse to fill the prescription, but who would confiscate the prescription so that it could not be filled elsewhere. In one highly publicized Op-Ed, a woman in her 40s wrote of not being able to get Plan B... and then having an abortion, when her Gift From God was several weeks older rather than a newly fertilized egg that might not have implanted anyway. This absolutely cannot be allowed -- a private citizen being in a position to not only opt out of a decision they disagree with, but to actually veto it on their own say-so.

The cab drivers working the Twin Cities airport who refuse to transport alcoholic beverages are another great example. They hold a public taxi license, and must serve the public.

[DelvinMcGee]

again the hundredth mention of the straw man argument of abortion as "the life of the mother or the child". The fact is that the percentage of abortions performed for medical reasons, versus pure convenience, are a tiny fraction.

[LynnDee]

"Leavitt said the regulation was intended to protect practitioners who have moral objections to abortion and sterilization, and would not interfere with patients' ability to get birth control or any legal medical procedure."

This is the paragraph I find most interesting. Protect practitioners who have moral objections to abortion and STERILIZATION!

What does sterilization have to do with conception? This is just another way to erode the rights already guarenteed under current laws for women. The goal is to do away with any form of birth control what so ever and dump more federal money into programs for teaching abstinance.

Could we get real here the abstinence programs do not work! The reality is that if we limit birth control in all forms we will have another health care epidemic on our hands. There will be so many unwanted children born that we will be overwhelmed with health care not just for the mother but the child and then the foster care system.

The hypocrisy here turns my stomach. As I hear the conservatives who fight birth control tooth and nail and state their life at conception ideology, then in the same breath I don't want my taxes going to pay for welfare Mama's and their brats.

So we will save that unborn child but to hell with him or her once you are born.

Yep what a moral victory!

[Twopennygal]

Sterilization: What about vasectomies? Now this fanaticism may be affecting men too...

[who38]

OMG. I missed the sterilization part. Bush has lost his mind.

[luziannagirl]

And another thing: this isn't about a doctor's right to practice medicine as he or she sees fit. There are now countless ways the government has curtailed and intervened in matters that have traditionally been solely between the physician and patient, and nobody else's business.

Paragoric, an opiate elixir preparation which is medically very useful and considered the drug of choice for some maladies, is now not available for prescription in the United States.

Marijuana in the smoked form is considered extremely effective for a handful of medical conditions and diseases, yet in most of the U.S. it is unavailable for prescription.

What's now termed "euthanasia" used to be as recently as the 1950's and 60's, called "easing people out". It was done quietly, reverently, and ROUTINELY at the request of the terminally ill and their families. Now doctors face felony charges if they engage in this extremely humanitarian practice which is one of the oldest services of the medical profession. Some still defy the law and do it anyway, and just constantly live under the specter of being exposed and going to prison.

So don't tell me this is about allowing doctors the freedom of practicing medicine how they see fit, because this is all about interfering with medicine by clipping doctors' wings, and it's what conservatives do best!

[jmpurser]

Okay, they're free from consequences from their employer. Now make them absolutely liable and financially responsible for every child born due to the infliction of the physician's religion on their patients. That's the full cost of raising the child and of course the cost of any health implications for the mother.

Time for some "personal responsibility" conservatives. Pay up.

[ttownrich]

So is having an abortion the "personally responsible" thing to do if someone accidentally gets pregnant?

Aren't there people who are willing to take on the costs and resposibilities of raising an unwanted through the process of adoption?

[LiberalDem]

Adoption is a great idea.....now, let's start with all of the "pro-life" team stepping up to the plate by adopting children who have been in foster homes for years because they are no longer cute, cuddly baby dolls -beccause they have emotional or physical problems...I could go on, but why bother?

You all just want to go to bed each night patting yourselves on the back because you're all soooo much moral than everyone else.

[who38]

There are 27,000 foster children in L.A. Want one?

[ttownrich]

Because having an abortion is the definition of someone facing up to their own personal responsiblity.....Give me a break

[Laserbeam]

What a great idea. Too bad it won't happen - if life were fair, it would. I love your post.

[nofltwlt]

Bush has never learned anything the easy way. Perhaps if one of his family desired to have an abortion it might change is little mind.

[who38]

LMAO. Perhaps, if.......You can bet that there are a number of Bush women who have used "family planning" techniques of many varieties. People who make these sweeping ethical pronouncements never mean that they will apply to them.

[who38]

I trust that there will be a list of these "ethical narcissists" available to the public so that we can avoid having to place our health care in their hands. Perhaps they could post a sign on their walls indicating their "ethical" preferences, similar to those in businesses that say they have the right to refuse service to anyone. I don't want to change the ethics of these people. I just want to avoid them.

[Annette]

Agreed. Let them minister to their flock and leave me alone.

[MrsGreebers]

Ladies, I would avoid going to Ron Paul to deliver your baby. Look it up.

[Old time Dem]

For once, I'm with Bush!

[primordialsoup]

Gee. I guess that means that soldiers have the right to refuse to kill, too.

[gotborked]

Yes, military service is voluntary.

[Annette]

Unless McCain gets in, he has made it pretty clear that he wants to bring back the draft.

My father and Uncles faught in WW2, as Quakers they were Chaplins, and medical personnel. My father was a medic. They did not carry guns. One uncle was an objector who helped build dams in Washington State. Now I imagine in Bushies army you would have to be willing to kill. If you become a quaker in Bush's army I guess there isn't any religious freedom there.

[rwe]

YES!!!!! They don't enlist voluntarily!!!!!!!!!!!!!Same as these patients can choose volutarily which doctor , which will be in jeopardy if we go socialist health care.

[wolfgangmo]

Yes, because if we have universal health care, then Stalin himself will do your girlfriends pap smear.

OOOOOOOOOOO. Socialism. I'm so scared that my bunny slippers just ran for cover.

Try to stay focused RWE.

[Retrofuturistic]

After they're born, you're allowed to kill them.... God said so.

[BPCentrisAmerican]

Ralph Reed was on Washington Journal this morning hawking John McCain as the pillar of virtue and defending the mess in Messopotamia, the same fellow who was implicated in shaking down Jack Abramoff for, even Tom Delay's chief of staff was shocked by the ruthlessness of his tactics. Several callers referred to him as hypocrite and a liar, which is about right along with selling his soul. What stuck me was how few independents were supportive of Mr. Reed’s and John McCain’s ideas and how uniformed the Republican base really is, it’s obvious to see why these people are so easy to shine on. One guy thought the bible should act as the bases of the Constitution and Mr. Reed burned 10 minutes on how he thought the guy was making a good point. As for King George the Bush, one can visualize a king sitting in his empty court eating a drum stick, crown tilted to the side, handing out decrees to the surfs. With Bush it's simply a matter of holding him in check and damage control, he can’t be gone soon enough.

[instagladiator]

Dick-tater-ship 101 reigns

[instagladiator]

Dictatorship 101, Part IV, Section 12,189

[wmholt]

This is absurd. You don't want a procedure done by a doctor that never does them! Doctors are not universally equipped to do abortions, so a person contemplating that procedure would go to someone that advertises that they do abortions, and also has a great deal of experience in that area, especially in handling any potential complications.

Next, we'll see a law saying that it's okay for Dermatologists to refuse to do tooth extractions! The nerve!

This is pure puffery and posturing on the part of the Republicans who trot out abortion every 4 years for Presidential elections. Even though they had the White House and both houses of Congress, the Republicans did not do anything significant to eliminate abortions. The rubes that believe they will this time are mental midgets who have no idea that they are being manipulated by Karl Rove.

[zoomzoomgal]

Yes, you're correct that going to a doctor who doesn't practice in a particular specialty is silly, particularly when you know what you need. The problem is like what happened in California. The couple was referred to another doctor for their medical procedure and they sued, saying the MD had no right to refuse them their procedure. NO RIGHT. If this truly was about wanting access to appropriate medical care, they would have never sued. There were MD's in the very same office who would do what they asked. THE VERY SAME OFFICE!
Let's be honest and call this what it is: Social engineering.
The law Bush offers seeks to protect against that.

[wolfgangmo]

Zoom,

It is not a law, but an administrative rule. Let's call it a fiat.

You are right about the lawsuit. First of all anyone can file. Most of these suits get tossed out in the discovery phase and never even see the light of day beyond some idiot reporter bringing it to our attention. Trust me when I say that the couple don't have a legal leg to stand on.

That is assuming that this is a real story and not some vague intertubes rumor. Care to share a link?

[Wilburrr]

People with 10 houses have the resources to fly anywhere in the world and get these procedures done safely. People who clean those houses do not. The anti abortion movement, although nobody is "pro abortion," exists simply to control women and works toward controlling women primarily of lower socioeconomic means.

If men could get pregnant, abortions would be available at the local mini mart.

[gotborked]

Can you comprehend the possibility that another human being might actually hold a position on a life and death issue for some other reason than a grasp for power?

If not, you have a very skewed view of humanity.

[KingCranky]

No, not after seeing the Bush Jr Administration in power, and pandering to the worst theological thugs and knuckle-dragging wingnuts for eight too-long years.

As long as the Bush Jr supporters are the first ones not to get vital medical treatments, procedures and medications from Dr's offended by treating Bush Jr lackeys, then this attempt to give religious swine far more rights than they deserve wouldn't be quite so aggravating.

[Wilburrr]

don't tell me.... let me guess: You are a male.

[luziannagirl]

Fine. Let medical professional refuse to participate in any theraputic procedure which violates their religious and moral convictions; abortion, vaccinations, organ transplants, sex and gender changes, the list is endless. We certainly wouldn't want any of our busy 500K a year lifesavers to lose any sleep over ethics.

Just make sure they haven't financed their expensive educations with our tax dollars, and make sure their often obscenely lucrative business ventures aren't receiving any corporate welfare courtesy the public sector.

After all, the public, We the People, have our ethical and moral standards, too.

[mirrimatmlw]

Trust me, the MDs who are doing abortions, unless they're the medical directors at large organizations, heads of large academic programs or in large hospital based subspecialty practices (like Dr. William Frist), aren't the ones making 500K or more a year by and large. Average medical incomes in this country are skewed by including those salaries.

You want that kind of income, you don't go into OB-GYN (the majority of abortion services providers are OB-GYNs). You go into plastic surgery, or ENT, or ophthalmology...none of which, last time I looked, do abortions. Or you make money the old-fashioned way: stocks or real estate.

And the last I looked, an average medical education (tuition alone, not even room and board) was above $200K for four years and rising...after another $100K or so for college.

[Annette]

I don't care if some doctors do not choose to do abortions as long as doctors who do abortion are allowed the same freedom to decide what proceedures they do.

Let those who do not want to participate not participate. But if freedom is truly free those who choose to make the decision to participate in offering choices to adults also should not be picketed, shot, abused, or harassed. Americans who find abortions morally offensive should not have abortions. Americans who believe Americans should make their own decisions should have no right to make the decision for others. I am so sick of the GOP nanny state deciding what is appropriate sexually, what medical proceedures are appropriate, and even how we should die. The GOP is so fond of calling others supporters of the nanny state when they want to keep childrens pajamas from being flamable,or when they object to arsonic in the water, or when they say wear seatbelts, however they cannot wait to tell you how to organize your medical care, who is appropriate to sleep with or what kind of Americans can enter into certain legal contract.

[jaschrod]

Looks like a lucrative business for some new young doctors. Specialization in abortions would be safer for the women, and prevent unwanted, and loved children being brought into this world. Being unwanted, and unloved is a horrible life for children.

McCain is against abortion, but had no problem making bombing runs from 35,000 feet, killing men, women, and children in a horrific way. These people only are interested in life at the time of birth, after that, to hell with them.

[Wilburrr]

No.... the A-4 Skyhawk was a low level attack bomber. Great for napalm and

[wolfgangmo]

Add to your list the fact that any residency that Doctors {MD only} serve is paid for with federal money. They should have to pay that back, their student loans, and feel free to follow their conscience as long as they do not receive ANY public money for as long as they live.

[zoomzoomgal]

Yes, wolfgang, student loans already have to be repaid.

[1099]

The next time you or a family members gets sick or needs an operation call you lawyer and let them take care of it for you.

[luziannagirl]

Cute comment 1099, but the joke's on you.

It's already getting to that point. Maybe not a lawyer per se, but already lots of people are treating themselves, using e-docs, going to various alternative medicine, and procuring services of all kinds of non-traditional practicioners before darkening the door of a doctor or hospital.

If mainstream American medicine doesn't clean up its sloppy act soon, they are going to be left unable to pay the utility bills on their McMansions and put gas in their Jags.

[BridgeMadison]

This isn't a case where medical students are choosing ob/gyn as their specialty and later being surprised by a change in the law that would compel them to provide treatment they object to. Physicians have a choice from the beginning of their professional careers. A doctor who doesn't want to be in the position of terminating a pregnancy can choose to be an obstetrician, GP, urologist or any other type of doctor. For doctors to purposely choose this specialty and then seek protection for refusing to provide medical treatment they know is legal and likely in their field of practice is wrong on so many levels.

Why does the Bush Administration protect a doctor's right to choose but not a woman's?

[MrCleaveland]

Uh, because one want to kill the innocent and the other doesn't?

[decibelJONES]

Regardless of anyone's BELIEFS there is no universal concensus as to when the rights of the unborn begin. BUT there is universal consensus as to the rights of an adult.
THEREFORE the law must favor the adult.

[turangaziza]

Right. Just ask the families of the 100,000 dead Iraqi civilians how George Bush feels about killing innocents.

How could you seriously defend him on these grounds?!

[instagladiator]

Tunnel vision?

[cornhuskersays]

Are you unable to see the forest for the tree's?

[luckyoldson]

"...one want to kill the innocent and the other doesn't..."

This is the kind insane comment that gives credence to the theory that Americans are just plain...dumb.

Doctors want to "kill the innocent."

Good lord...

[elbzee]

"Why does the Bush Administration protect a doctor's right to choose but not a woman's?"

WOW! BEST COMMENT ON THIS POST!
AMEN BridgeMadison!!!!

[wmholt]

"For doctors to purposely choose this specialty and then seek protection for refusing to provide medical treatment they know is legal and likely in their field of practice is wrong on so many levels."

When you say, "this specialty", do you mean OB-GYN? They either do abortions or they don't. A woman would want someone with *experience* to do the surgical procedure, and the way to gain that experience is to do a lot of abortions.

There is no way that one can legislate that the physician gain skill in an area that he or she is not interested in. If your doctor felt it was wrong to do abortions, he would not have gained any substantial experience in that area. I wouldn't want my loved one to be one of the first twenty cases this doctor ever did!

Medicine is very broad and many physicians choose a limited area to focus on. I called a G.I. doctor that did my colonoscopy for an office appointment. I was told that he did not do office appointments, and that he only did colonoscopies all day long! (Yeccchhh!)

That may be taking specialization too far. Wouldn't the physician's other skills atrophy over time if they are not used?

My point is that experience is the key. Don't ever go to any doctor that has not done a lot of the procedures you are contemplating.

[who38]

Because religious zealots are Republicans and most women are Democrats.

[zoomzoomgal]

What the....?!?

[Retrofuturistic]

VERY good question.

[zoomzoomgal]

And why do you deny choice to everyone BUT a pregnant women seeking an abortion? So while we're on that subject, if you really want her to have a choice, do you oppose providing her with informed consent about the risks of this serious medical procedure?