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Loading ...New Bush medical rules could harm LGBT, HIV patients
12.19.2008 3:51pm EST
(Washington) The Bush administration, in its final days, has issued a federal rule reinforcing protections for doctors and other health care workers who refuse to participate in abortions and other procedures because of religious or moral objections.
Critics say the protections are so broad they limit a patient’s right to get care and accurate information.“The refusal clause goes beyond women’s health and a woman’s right to an abortion or birth control,” said openly lesbian Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin.
“Under the new regulations, a doctor may also refuse to treat a gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender person. Medical care must be based on science and the patients’ best interest, not the providers’ religious, political, or other philosophical views.”
The Human Rights Campaign also expressed concern over the new Department of Health and Human Services regulations, saying they could be used by a provider to administer an HIV test to a gay patient, and even be exempt from the statutory duty to tell the patient where else he could receive the test.
Under the regulations, a pharmacist could refuse to fill a prescription for hormone therapy if he or she has religious objection to transgender people.
It could also threaten women’s access to comprehensive health care by permitting pharmacists to refuse to dispense contraception even when doing so significantly burdens the patient’s access, or to refuse to participate in an emergency abortion even when the woman’s health is at risk.
The regulations override many state laws protecting patients’ access to medical services.
“These regulations sacrifice patients’ right to medical care, permitting providers to refuse to do their jobs when they choose,” said HRC President Joe Solmonese. “We ask the Bush administration: what happened to ‘first, do no harm?’ Denying patients legal, safe medical treatments for any reason is simply wrong, and violates the trust that all Americans, regardless of our sexual orientation or gender identity, place in our doctors, nurses, and pharmacists.”
HRC submitted comments objecting to these regulations when they were proposed, asking the administration to amend them to protect patients while preserving religious liberty.
“We are now calling on Congress to take action to eliminate these harmful regulations, and will encourage the incoming HHS leadership to amend them through the regulatory process,” said Solmonese.
“Religious liberty”, eh?
If you’re devout enough to take offense at the act of merely physically handing out a prescription drug you consider disagreeable… well, then maybe you should have used your religious liberty to think through the religious implications of your chosen profession before choosing it.
The government is not forcing anyone to become a pharmacist or health care provider. Thus, requiring that people who choose to enter these publicly important (and historically state-regulated) positions perform their duties on an equally accessible basis does not violate their “religious liberty” in the least.
Typical of the Religious Right to sell their propaganda with a line that sounds worthy of concern, but isn’t actually supported by the facts at hand. (Of COURSE religious liberty is important, like any other liberty – but is it REALLY burdened here?)
‘Quarantine HIV carriers’
>By Jaspal Singh
IPOH, MALAYSIA: HIV carriers must never be allowed to marry, says Perak Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin.
Echoing the controversial views of Perak Mufti Datuk Seri Harussani Zakaria, Nizar said those who were infected with HIV should instead be quarantined and everything should be done to treat them.
Three years ago, Harussani had caused an uproar when he proposed that HIV/AIDS carriers should be quarantined in an isolated place, such as an island, to ensure that they did not infect others.
“Allowing this (marriage involving HIV carriers) is very unfair.
“Somebody who is very sick like that should not be allowed to get married,” Nizar said after meeting mosque officials at his residence here yesterday.
He said this when asked to comment on the statement by Department of Islamic Development Malaysia (Jakim) director-general Datuk Wan Mohamad Sheikh Abdul Aziz that those who tested positive for HIV would still be allowed to marry.
Last Friday, Wan Mohamad was reported as saying that HIV carriers would receive counselling on the preventive measures that they should take.
Nizar said while it was bad enough to allow an HIV carrier to marry a non-HIV carrier, it was even worse if both partners were HIV carriers.
“If there’s any breeding, sorry for having to use that word, the embryo will also carry the same virus. So, that is even more unfair because you are actually passing that disease on to the child. It is very unjust to the child.”
When a reporter suggested that HIV-infected couples could get married but abstain from sexual intercourse, Nizar retorted: “How is that a marriage then? Obviously they will indulge in sexual intercourse.
“We don’t know what will happen. They are legally married… anything can happen. So if there’s a child, what happens?”
Nizar also disagreed that HIV carriers should be allowed to marry so that they could care for each other emotionally and physically and lead a normal life.
“Once a person is confirmed as an HIV carrier, it is difficult for him or her to lead a normal life.
“But, if the government insists on allowing HIV couples to marry, then a thorough review should be carried out.
“Until and unless that is done, to allow such marriages would be a gross error,” he said, adding that it was pointless to screen couples for HIV infection if those who were infected were allowed to get married.
If there’s any breeding, sorry for having to use that word, the embryo will also carry the same virus. It is very unjust to the child.’
How is that a marriage then? Obviously they will indulge in sexual intercourse. They are legally married… anything can happen.’
I realize this is a bad law, but has anyone recognized this irony at the upmost here? Hey! Listen!!! This is a two way street! This means if you don’t like President Bush and he needs you to give him CPR, He needs his bed pan changed, He needs insulin, or what ever- you don’t have to give it to him or any other red neck hillbilly. Don’t get me going on what I think of Chayne.
Do you realize what this means? Do you really understand how many of us gay people are in health care inside of America? If they don’t want to help us, guess what? By this law: We don’t have to give the “Bushies/ religious hypocrites” their meds, wipe their bottoms, feed them, come to their homes in our ambulances, give them aid, or heart surgery if it offends our belief system. If they want to get the Darwin Award for supporting this Law more power to them.
Let Jesus give them their meds or change their poopy pants. Need air? too bad! After all Jesus said “doctor heal yourself.” So let them heal themselves. I keep hearing they think prayer solves everything. As they say in Missouri: “Show Me.”
Remember it was a gay man (John Watson) that help figured out DNA, and that lead to getting bacteria to make human insulin. Maybe insulin or any type of genetic generated medicine should not be allowed sold to anyone who hates gays. As stupid as it sounds it would solve a lot of problems.
It’s like President Bush trying to get rid of Medicaid or Social Security. The Republicans and the Social Conservatives will come out of the wood work screaming “don’t you dare take our (communistic welfare- that’s what they call it when they don’t like it) endowments out of cold dying hands.” They will say the same thing when this law turns around and bites them.
This religious INSANITY has broken new lows in how to hurt people! The regulation is so broad that almost any reason could be used under the guise of religious or moral objections to deny treatment to anyone. This could be used as the guise of racial discrimination.
This regulation could mean that I could be denied getting testosterone supplement because I could get an erection and have “gay sex” which is against their religious beliefs. So my prescription wouldn’t be filled. Now that I am loosing muscle mass due to the low Test.levels, sex has nothing to do with it. PharmD are not MD and do not know the medical consequences of denial of medications. The Hippocratic oath will be ignored in favor of intolerance under the guise of federal regulations. But Mr Bush is acting not as president but as moral arbitrator, i.e. who proceeds at his own discretion, of the country. He has issued just another of divisive regulation,without care for its consequences.
PLEASE complain to your Congressman and 2 US Senators against this horrendous EDICT. Without your input to congress, George Bush stick it to the LGBT community one last time. There is less than 30 day before he is out of control, but overthrowing a regulation in place requires a law and the religious right will do everything against us.
i think this is bullshit!!! this practically says that i can die becuz a doctor doesnt want to treat me cuz im a lesbian… WTF ARE OUR RIGHTS GOING?!?!
Reaction from Obama spokesman according to Chicago Tribune:
“Asked about the rule Thursday, a spokesman for Obama’s transition team said the president-elect ‘will review all 11th-hour regulations and will address them once he is president.’”
You really think that the president of a nation that couldn’t go to the UN and say, “Killing gay people is wrong™”, cares about ensuring that we get access to medical care?
Wake up.
We’re lucky they havn’t started the camps yet.
Just working on his “worst president ever” title. Can he just go??? He has the worst ratings. Doesn’t he ask to himself why? Is he really as stupid as he seems? My gosh I can’t wait for Obama, even with the fatso participating in the event, anything but this.
The regulation also allows any insurance company (or any individual employee of the insurance company) to refuse to cover any procedure on the same grounds.
So even if the medical staff are not bigots hopefully the employees who process the paperwork at your insurance company not bigots either.
Amend?
No. Simply repeal them.
Tammy, Health Care is responsibility not a right don’t confuse the two.
why is it so that we havent changed in our understanding of people even slightly different than us in our choices?
gays have the right to medical care just as much as a person who is straight.
have we learned nothing as a nation?
a doctor’s ability to stomach letting some one die or suffer with out medical treatment is discraceful.is only treating people who they deem worthy to recieve treatment ethical? ask yourself, your religion. for those who use that as a defence. christianity is about tolorance, love for each other and God. the hate in this country disgusts me.
On the plus side, with all the people Bush has screwed during his time in office he’d better pray he doesn’t fall ill. If I was a doctor I know I would have a moral objection to treating him. I wonder how many other doctors and nurses would find they too had such an objection…
There is no arguing that can be done with the ignorance of others, the only exception being to silence them. -Unknown
So this man must be silenced.
Rednecks have better morals than Pres. Bush. That scum has removed the basic God goven rights and protections of human beings.