For the last year, my 'work' was being a student, and I had a lot of things to say about it. Before that, my job in training & development provided me with endless things to talk about. There was always something interesting to say about a participant or a class or new place I had visited.
Since school ended, I haven't had a lot to say, and it is beginning to worry me. I keep thinking that there should be something interesting rolling around in this head of mine...interesting enough to right about, and there just hasn't been. Or perhaps, I have just become unintersting or lazy.
However, there has been something that has been bothering me since I read about it. This issue struck a nerve with me the first moment I heard about it. This is pretty much the gist of it:
Some doctors and residents in the Humboldt region are upset the hospital will no longer allow tubal ligations to be performed because the procedure contravenes Roman Catholic teachings on sterilization.
I have a couple of issues with deciding to ban tubal ligations from being performed at the Humboldt hospital. First, the reasoning is based on religion. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with religion. However, I do believe that religion and worship is a very personal choice, and I am not an advocate of individuals pushing their beliefs onto others. For a hospital to decide for the masses (masses of Humbodlt and surrounding area, I guess) that a surgery will not be performed because it goes against the teachings of the Catholic church, is doing just that, pushing their beliefs onto others. Perhaps there is a woman who is not Catholic, who wants a tubal ligation and lives in Humboldt, she has essentially been denied a PUBLIC SERVICE.
This bring me to my second, yet related point. The decision is essentially a form of discrimination. If you are Catholic, and practise the Catholic faith, this decision really doesn't affect you and you are good to go. But if you worship another religion, I guess you are shit out of luck if you want to receive the surgery. Too bad you didn't live somewhere else.
I can understand individuals making personal medical choices based on their religion. For example, when a blood transfusion is denied due to relgious beliefs. But when groups of people and boards are making decisions that effect the general public, and those decisions are based off religion, that is wrong.
It will be intersting to see how this situation plays out.
4 comments:
Myself wondered if this kind of elective surgery is also banned for men - do guys who want to get snipped also have to go elsewhere? So far, I've *only* heard it related to tubal ligations.
I'm torn on this one too.
On the one hand, I applaud the hospital board for standing up for their beliefs. While tubal ligations are an elective publically-funded operation (as are abortions, vasectomies, and other minor surgeries), the operating board of the hospital obviously feels they have a moral duty to their Faith. I think that's cool.
On the other hand, it would make sense then to return or deny the amount of money they would have received from the government for those surgeries...which is to say, if you are a publically funded organisaiton, you have a responsibility to the public, I should think, as well...the 'mass public', I mean. If you want to run a private organisation, you can run it in whatever way you feel is best.
Again, it's different to run a private business versus a government-funded business.
Gah. It occurs to me I'm not making a very good point. I admire the hospital board's decision, but wonder if it's altogether "just" because they're a publically funded operation.
On the other-other hand, I am appalled to hear that women who have had C-Sections, even ELECTIVE C-sections (a practise I find abhorrent) are now asked by their doctor, "would you like me to give you a tubal ligation while I'm in there?". I see the point - if you want it done, you might as well get it done while you're already splayed open like a side of beef. It just bothers me, I guess.
Really, the whole practise of surgical sterilisation bothers me on many levels, but that's a rant for another time.
Anyway, my point here originally was that I wonder why they've singled out tubal ligations and not vasectomies. And is it *all* tubal ligations, or only the elective (non-necessary) ones? And are they just telling the doctors they can't offer them during C-sections, or are they denying ALL tubal ligations...like if Jane Q. Humboldt walks in off the street and says "Tie me up!", do they just have to say no?
From what I have heard they are singling out tubal ligations due to the fact that they are surgeries and need to be performed in the hospital. As for vasectomies, they can be performed in a doctor's office and therefore do not fall under this moral dilemna that hospital is faced with. As far as I am aware, vasectomies are still allowed.
I agree whole-heartedly with your comments on public versus private organizations. If this was a private hospital, then fine, do whatever your investors see fit. But this hospital is publicly funded and they are denying citzens who have paid handsomely for public services, like healthcare, and now they are denying them the right to tubal ligations, an elective surgery.
I don't have an issue with individuals or groups of individuals standing up for their beliefs, however I do have a problem when it negatively impacts or harms other individuals.
As for your last comment/question, I seem to remember them saying something about offerring tubal ligations ONLY during a C-section, and if you refused you weren't able to return at a later date to elect for the surgery. But that is a very vague memory. Perhaps I should do some more research on this topic
Good discussion.
Unlike Cenobyte, I disapprove strongly of the Board of Directors' decision and I don't think this "moral duty" should be a source of pride. They may have their beliefs, but they are running a public hospital and (if Humbolt is typical of most Saskatchewan towns) they are running the only hospital in the area. Their duty of care to their patients should outweigh any personal hangups.*
We'd think it wrong if the Board of Directors had deeply held racist beliefs and refused to let black people donate blood. We'd think it wrong if an orthodox Jewish obstetrician circumcised all babies that she delivered regardless of the parents' wishes.
Why is this different?
(And I'm not even going to start about the misogyny of refusing tubal ligations but not even attempting to limit vasectomies, otherwise this comment will be longer than it already is. Grr.)
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* Wow, footnotes in a comment. Anyway, I originally wrote something longer and more harsh than "hangups" but this probably shouldn't turn into a discussion of religion. So I may be trivializing their deeply held beliefs here, but this is as nice as I can be right now.
Whether or not vasectomies can be performed in a doctor's office oughtn't be an issue; it's still an invasive surgical procedure (unless they're cinching off some poor schmo's nuts with tight rubber bands like they do when they castrate bulls, which I *hope* isn't the case). Why allow one and not the other? (Yes, I know what the arguments are here; this is the part of the puzzle that I wonder about the most, though)
That's what gets me.
Again, it boils down to the publically funded institution issue, I think. If the hospital were privately funded and privately administered, they could choose to allow or disallow whatever the hell they wanted based on their religious (or racist, or sexuality-ist, or otherwise) beliefs. But they're *not*. A private institution.
I applaud the strength they have in their Faith. I don't think they have the right to dictate allowable procedures based on that faith in a publically funded institution.
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