584,000 medical entities could lose federal funding for not accomodating anti-choice employees...

[cynatnite]

The Bush administration yesterday announced plans to implement a controversial regulation designed to protect doctors, nurses and other health-care workers who object to abortion from being forced to deliver services that violate their personal beliefs.

The rule empowers federal health officials to pull funding from more than 584,000 hospitals, clinics, health plans, doctors' offices and other entities if they do not accommodate employees who refuse to participate in care they find objectionable on personal, moral or religious grounds.

snip:
The proposed regulation, which could go into effect after a 30-day comment period, was welcomed by conservative groups, abortion opponents and others as necessary to safeguard workers from being fired, disciplined or penalized in other ways. Women's health advocates, family planning advocates, abortion rights activists and others, however, condemned the regulation, saying it could create sweeping obstacles to a variety of health services, including abortion, family planning, end-of-life care and possibly a wide range of scientific research.

"It's breathtaking," said Robyn S. Shapiro, a bioethicist and lawyer at the Medical College of Wisconsin. "The impact could be enormous."

The regulation drops the most controversial language in a draft version that would have explicitly defined abortion for the first time in a federal law or regulation as anything that interfered with a fertilized egg after conception. But both supporters and critics said the regulation remains broad enough to protect pharmacists, doctors, nurses and others from providing birth control pills, Plan B emergency contraception and other forms of contraception, and explicitly allows workers to withhold information about such services and refuse to refer patients elsewhere.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/21/AR2008082102818_pf.html

:grr:

[TechBear_Seattle]

1. So if a Christian Scientist worked in the health care industry....

And given that one of the core doctrines of Christian Science is that medicine is a sin which demonstrates a lack of faith in God's mercy and power of healing, the federal government would pull funding from hospitals, clinics, health plans, doctor's offices and other entities if they do not accomodate employees who refuse to participate in care they find objectionable on personal, moral or religious grounds?

[trashcanistanista]

3. There are also some religions that are against

donating or receiving blood. If these people are accomodated, people will die.

[trashcanistanista]

2. How can the president implement this.

Wouldn't it have to go through Congress first? This is terrible!

[LeftHander]

4. Religious healthcare orgs don't have to treat homosexuals....

That is who it is going to hurt most. The right wing fundies have been waging a policy war against LGBT community with G.W. at the lead.

[trashcanistanista]

5. If this goes nto effect it virtually eliminates

and argument in favor of single payer govt. issued health care. So they are killing two birds with one stone here.

[FKA MNChimpH8R]

6. Wouldn't this be reversible by a President Obama

if it is not authorized by Congress?

[JDPriestly]

7. That is going to create quite a backlash among the vast majority

of medical personnel who favor birth control bills, contraception, etc. Think about the additional patients and work these people will have to take care of if a few of their co-workers refuse to do it. Why would a person go into Gyn-Obstetrics if anti-choice. What is there for such a person to do? And pharmacists? Can you imagine this scene going on 40 times a day at your local pharmacy? "Hey, Julie, will you take this one. She wants birth control pills?" Or worse, what happens if pharmacies have to make room for two lines, one for birth control stuff and the other for everything? Yeah, these anti-choice employees are going to be real popular in the workplace.

This is not a practical plan. The employer won't be able to discriminate against the anti-choice cads, but that does not mean that they will be popular.

This is especially interesting because the rule with regard to other types of discrimination is that regardless of the type of discrimination alleged -- disability, race, gender, age, religion, etc., the person alleging discrimination has to be able to show that he or she is qualified to do the job. So, if you have a disability that prohibits you from lifting more than 20 pounds, and the job from which you are barred requires lifting 40 pounds at a time, you are not qualified and probably will not prevail on a claim of disability discrimination.

Here, the people who would claim discrimination based on this rule would, by definition, not be able to do the job demanded.

Unlike other discrimination law, this law would force employers to change the job description to avoid discrimination. I wonder what employers will think about this.

Say you have two licensed pharmacists. One is anti-choice, the other is pro-choice. One will not prescribe or sell contraceptives. The other will. How are you going to arrange the schedule? Obviously, you either have to have both pharmacists on duty at all times and close the rest of the time, forgo sales of contraceptives when the anti-employee is on duty or hire a third person. So, unlike other anti-discrimination law, this law puts a really punitive burden on the employer and the co-employees.

I think there will be a backlash.