If you’re morally opposed to performing a certain task at work, could you be protected by law not to have to do that task? Late last week, the Department of Health and Human Services announced plans to implement a regulation designed to protect health care workers who are against abortion from being forced to deliver services that violate their personal beliefs. The rule empowers federal health officials to pull funding from health care providers if they do not accommodate employees who refuse to participate in care they find objectionable on personal, moral or religious grounds.
Naturally, the first to cry foul are pro-abortion rights groups. Politics aside, however, pondering this new legislation brings up some questions. For example, why would a health care worker take a job where procedures they opposed were being performed? Does the regulation mean a health care worker can actually refuse to provide or refer a patient to care elsewhere for the care that violates their beliefs.. and does that violate the Hippocratic Oath?
What if this proposed regulation applied to other industries? Could a vegetarian waiter or waitress opt out of serving meat to customers? Or should that server simply find work in a vegetarian restaurant? Does this regulation give additional support to conscientious objectors who seek not to fight in a war because of their personal, moral, or religious grounds?
Perhaps protecting certain beliefs is not something that should be addressed at work at all. When we go to work, we effectively “sell” our skills—for money--to our employer. Part of this transaction is that we obey the policies and procedures of that workplace regardless of how we feel about them. If we don’t like it, we can seek employment elsewhere.
Comments
Who needs protection? If I can't do a foley on a patient (for example....I can actually), I just ask someone for help, sit back and let them do it. Why does everything have to be at the federal government level? If the HCW was THAT upset, they should work someplace that dies not allow such things to happen. Otherwise, this whole issue smacks of political meandering where once again, the government has no place or say.
I agree. let them go to work in places that will fulfill their personal needs. with a high unemployment rate, there should be no problem finding workers to fill these positions. health care workers who object to abortions, transplants,autopsies, even transfusions, can always work in senior care facilities. I am sure that their personal satisfaction in their beliefs will more than make up for the lesser compensations offered. ps: I am anti-abortion and chose not to go into healthcare, though I come from a family of medical professionals (both parents and siblings). I find it somewhat amusing that people want high paying professions and then want to change the rules. Hey,what will be next, not wanting to care for jews or blacks?
As a pharmacist and a christian, I wil not dispense drugs used for abortion or so called "Plan B". We have always had the right to refuse to dispense anything that we are morally opposed to. This government action is nothing new. I have changed companies before bcause of an attempt by them to coerce me imto dispensing certain drugs, and yes I will find other employment before I compromise my christian faith. God will always come before work or goverment.
"When we go to work, we effectively “sell” our skills—for money--to our employer. Part of this transaction is that we obey the policies and procedures of that workplace regardless of how we feel about them."
Very good my friend, very good. So if your employer tells you to burn the office, would you do it? If your employer tells you to lie to a customer, would you do it?
No. I would not do it. "oh, then look for employment somewhere else". I bet that's what people were told at the beginning of the industrial revolution. "Work 90 hours a week, and bring your kids to work too, and do not complain about your miserable pay. If you do not like it, look for a job somewhere else!".
People need to work, and there are only so many places where people can work. So the government MUST protect people in their workplace, to prevent employers from using their power to force people to do what they do not want to do, when they do not want to do it for a good reason, like for instance, killing babies in the wombs of their mothers.
Could a vegetarian waiter or waitress opt out of serving meet to customers?
When is legislation coming to protect those that refuse to proofread their writing?
FYI.. spellcheck doesn't recognize the improper use of homynyms. Let's meet over some meat to discuss this. They're over there petting their dogs....By the way, more legislation isn't what this country needs. Enforcing the laws on the books would do fine for now until we can remove usless overreaching laws.
As our culture continues to coarsen, those who have "moralized" justification for killing a 7 month old unborn child, are in ascension in politics. When asked about evil, Obama should have mentioned this.
Wow... just wow, the analogies you make are so bad! A doctor should not be forced to refer a patient who wants an abortion to another doctor unless they choose to. A vegetarian waitress should not be forced to allow a carnivore to eat meat. Note: It's spelled meat. It's not "Legislating Conscience" it's actually the separation of church and state. The state actually isn't telling people what to do, amazing!
People need the right to do as they choose and face their own consequences. If you know a doctor won't perform an abortion or won't refer you to a doctor who will, then don't go there. If you know a waitress won't serve you meat, don't go there. If you don't believe the wars your country are fighting are just. Don't support them, if drafted (we have a volunteer army), then draft dodge. Decisions have consequences, for doctors, waiters, and generals, let them face the consequences.
This administration believes in free market and minimal government intervention only when it suits them. Your last sentence sums it up -medical personal simply should seek employment where their moral beliefs align with their employer's beliefs. It amazes me however, that anyone supports a rapist right to chose his child's mother.
I just got out of a hospital after 6 days.
After surgery the nurses were so loud and would not help me. I heard them use this excuse. Refusal to help a patient.
My bladder was distended so badly and without help I had to call my doctor from my cell phone.
Also, the mintue I got to the room, the nurses tried to get rid of me, telling me to go home.
I got so sick I almost died there and my visit was 6 days instead of 4. It cost the hospital plus my insurance.
They did not want to work. This is a good hospital and I complained once I got home.
I had ovarian cancer surgery.
I would have died if my doctor had not intervened. They didn't even know where my bladder was? They were all obese from always ordering from the restaurant and also talked about every patient on the floor. My room was next to the nurses station.
This experience was out of a Stephen King Novel.
The nurses were insane.
Houston TX
At a local hospital a nurse working there is very opposed to homosexuality. Her religious and moral teachings tell her that it is against God's will. So now, she should feel empowered to deny health care to any homosexual who has the unfortunate luck of being placed under her care.
May God have mercy on us all.
"Part of this transaction is that we obey the policies and procedures of that workplace regardless of how we feel about them. If we don’t like it, we can seek employment elsewhere"
Amen! We have all had to do things we don't necessarily agree with at some point in our life. Our personal beliefs have to take a back seat to the patient's welfare. This is why we are in this industry, to help others, not to push our beliefs on them.
That's the reason why we can't trust everything we read! ... we all know that journalist also sell their skills to their employer's and so they have to write and express their opinion and everything around us is just manipulated....
Matt makes some good points, especially about facing the consequences of our own actions--but he misses a fundamental one. Yes, we all should decide for themselves what is morally right for ourselves. But when our decision conflicts with our employer's, we must accept the consequence of being fired.
Let's support the pharmicist's decision not to dispense drugs whom he/she is opposed to, and support the decision of employers to fire employees who won't do the job for which they are hired.
Your vegetarian v. medical professional analogy is a little flawed. The health care field has much more diverse opportunities than food service for those who just wish to find employment elsewhere.
I do agree with your conclusion, though. Thank you for this article.
I wrote <a href="http://sawaboof.blogspot.com/2008/08/faith-in-humanity-dwindles-by-day.html">a blog about this</a> a few days ago...
And today I learn again that html tags don't work everywhere. Sorry, folks. ::hides in shame::
:-(
There is a huge difference in an abortion and serving up a tossed salad. There is no real comparison between being asked to help kill an innocent tiny human and serving someone's supper to their table! It appalls me that you would imply that there is. Your article was written in an effort to put a spin on the truth, and you know it, and so do prolifers.
There is a First Amendment that gives U.S.citizens the freedom to worship GOD in all that they do. We do not have to confine our beliefs to the four walls of a Church. GOD wrote in stone, 'thou shalt not kill' Exodus 20:13. I suspect that when you are the innocent person about to be killed, you would much prefer that nurses and doctors adhere to the laws of GOD and not their job.
You should educate yourself on the grim horror of an abortion before you write on the topic. It is the most gruesome, bloody, awful event especially if the baby is developed [ 10 days post conception] and it shears off the very soul of the mother. The only way even abortionists "can do" [their newest slogan] is to separate their minds from what their hands are doing--schizophrenic split in a person.
Get a real life and get some truth in your advertising please. Signed gloria poole, RN and artist. You might like to view my original paintng,'birthing a baby" at this website of mine:
http://choose-life.name
I'm fairly sure a soldier would be justified in disobeying an unlawful order -- say, killing an Al Qaeda prisoner taken in battle -- and yet remain in good standing as a member of the armed forces. Why couldn't a nurse in a clinic refuse to kill an unborn baby if he or she considered it an unlawful or immoral act, without harm to a health services career? I suspect that in our upside-down culture, the left would praise the soldier, and persecute the nurse.
"For example, why would a health care worker take a job where procedures they opposed were being performed?"
Was there any thought whatsoever put into that question? Throw out the baby with the bathwater much? Think about it. Just to illustrate the sheer stupidity of that question, here's another: Why would anyone support a candidate for whom they did not agree 100% on every issue?
Or how about this: If you're an obnoxiously militant anti-smoker, or anti-drinker, why would you shop at any store that sold cigarettes? Or, more to the point, why would take employment at such a place?
The answer to either of these (naturally, obviously, of course, and DUH) is simple, regardless how one feels about the exception asked for in this issue: Very little in the world is tailor made to our individual preferences and sensibilities. So we are forced to compromise.
That's why.
Ethical issues are just that way. What happens if a patient declines a doctor's treatment option for religious or whatever reason. I think issues of this nature are better handled by compromise. Individual case should be handled according to its merit and not by leglation. Referals can be used as safety valves.
So if the employees are protected and a bunch of right to lifers get themselves hired into jobs that entail performing abortions they can simply refuse to participate and they can't be fired. Seems to me that this is another back door strategy to take away a woman's right to choose. When it comes to this issue, I wouldn't trust anything coming out of Bush's mouth.
BTW, since when has Bush ever been concerned about protecting a workers rights? NEVER!!!
First, the original Hippocratic Oath refused to perform abortions. Adolph Hitler was the first to remove not performing abortions from that oath.
If a vegetarin does not want to bring me meat, fine. If I am eating meat...which I do on a daily basis...I would find it humorous that a neurotic vegetarian did not want to bring it to me. BTW, to be vegetarian is to BE neurotic by definition IMNSHO.
...and as for 'protecting someone's right to not violate their beliefs? Oh, please.
Every day my rights to live as I would like, teach my children as I like, and believe as I like is assaulted by the media, Hollywood, and this government.
So what happens when a doctor decides that the mothers life is in immediate danger and with the mothers consent decides that the proper course of action is to abort the fetus. Then the ER nurse refuses to participate and the mother dies. The nurse over-rode the doctors and the patients decisions and unilaterally decided what was the right thing to do for the patient even though they were less qualified to make the decision then the doctor and had less at stake then the patient.
To me this nurse should be charged with murder, not protected by the law. Yes this scenario is unlikely but it will happen.
This is a real simple problem. If a medical person has personal issues with being involved with abortions then they need to choose a job in a field that doesn't involve them. They don't need the protection of the federal government to allow them to refuse to do their job.
How about instead if we make a law that makes it mandatory to state in a persons job description if they will be required to participate in abortion activities. This would be informed consent, if the person accepts the job then they know what their job duties entail and can not refuse to participate without risking the lose of their job.
Many of us do distasteful things in our jobs that we'd rather not have to do. What if a soldier decided that it was immoral to shoot another human being and refused to be deployed to combat? Would we be willing to protect them with a new law or should they be sent to military prison for dereliction of duty? They knew when they signed up with the military that their job may include killing, if that was unacceptable then they shouldn't have signed up. The nurse at least has the option to quit and find a new job if they have moral objections.
No they absolutely don't need a law to protect them. This is simply Bush trying to play election year politics with one of his favorite hot button issues. The question right to lifers need to ask themselves is, how much change did Bush actually make? For 6 years he had congress in his back pocket and he made no real effort to move the abortion issue forward. Instead he has used it solely to manipulate voters. Obama on the other hand has said he doesn't want to take away a woman's right to choose but he wants to work with the right to life movement to reduce the number of abortions by giving pregnant women better alternatives. What if he could cut the number of abortions in half? This would be a huge reduction in abortion compared to Bush's total lack of success. That's not playing politics, that's trying to work towards a solution. Fixing 50% of a problem now is better than just talking about fixing a 100% of a problem but actually doing nothing.
Oh, here we go.
No one has ever said to let the mother die.
Besides, you using the sometime need of choosing between the mother's life and the child's life does not excuse allowing children who survive the abortion process to die in a cold metal sink, as Obama is in support of based on his legislative record.
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