July 22, 2009
Catholic healthcare faces big issues
Health Care Reform Dilemma Among Urgent Issues Facing Catholic Healthcare
Catholic health organizations advocate for healthcare reform as a matter of social justice. However, some reforms could lead to an expanded role for government that would further erode the autonomy of Catholic hospitals–especially if a plan mandates that contraception, sterilization, abortion or abortion referrals be provided at all hospitals regardless of religious affiliation.
This is just one of the issues examined in Diagnosis Critical: The Urgent Threats Confronting Catholic Healthcare (Our Sunday Visitor, June 2009) by healthcare law expert Leonard J. Nelson III, professor at the Cumberland School of Law of Samford University.
Catholic facilities face increased pressure as they seek to maintain their tax-exempt status and eligibility for federal funding. Pending legislation, such as the Freedom of Choice Act, could mean that Catholic medical centers may be forced to shut down, or to provide services deemed morally wrong by the Church. Tens of thousands of Catholic doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals could be forced to quit their jobs or violate their religious beliefs.
The continued existence of Catholic healthcare in the U.S. requires legal protection–”conscience clauses”–for institutions and individuals who refuse to provide such services, says Nelson. “We are already seeing an erosion of conscience protection with regard to pharmacists who object to dispensing Plan B.”
Other challenges facing Catholic healthcare include:
•threats posed to Catholic hospitals if legislation such as the Freedom of Choice Act or Prevention First are passed, particularly if they override current conscience protection clauses;
•the difficulties Catholic hospitals face in an increasingly competitive marketplace and in a society permeated by the sexual revolution and the “culture of death”;
•end-of-life issues such as the controversy over withdrawing assisted nutrition and hydration from patients in persistent vegetative states such as in the Terri Schiavo case.
Catholic healthcare providers may have to focus their efforts on creating alternatives to acute care hospitals, such as free clinics, specialized centers for reproductive medicine, and hospices for end-of-life care, Nelson concludes. These initiatives could reinvigorate the religious healthcare ministry, he says, allowing a full embrace of the primary role of Catholic health care: providing support for the culture of life and evangelizing the secular culture.
# # #
Print This Post
Email This Post
Discuss this article
July 30, 2009
I have been working for a Catholic hospital for eighteen years in Greenville, South Carolina. It has a wonderful mission and vision which all the employees believe in with all their heart. We have a strong compassion for our patients and care about each person no matter what faith they may be.
I believe the Health Care Reform needs to leave the Catholic hospitals alone and stop changing everything. If they try to close all the Catholic hospitals there will be alot of people without jobs that the government will have to support. The President needs to be helping people keep their jobs not keep trying to close Catholic hospitals and cause millions of people to lose their jobs that they have done for many years. We love our Catholic hospitals and I am not Catholic. Our hospital shows a true value to their patients. When you walk in our halls everyone is very friendly and we assist whoever crosses our path daily. It seems like all Congress wants to do is take God out of everything any more and it makes me wornder what our President is really trying to do to our country.
The Freedom of Choice Act strikes me as extreme irony in its name. Remember the old saw: “One man’s meat is another man’s poison?” Well, in this case “freedom” for some to act according to their will means for others an infringement of their freedom to act according to their will. My Dad used to say that his neighbor’s freedom to swing his arms stopped at the end of my Dad’s nose!