But Eve Pidgeon, a spokeswoman for Trinity Health, told CNSNews.com in a statement that “this case has no merit”. The lawsuit accuses Trinity Health of denying women reproductive health procedures such as emergency abortions. The statement added further, “Catholic bishops are not licensed medical professionals and have no place dictating how doctors practice medicine, especially when it violates federal law”.
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In the lawsuit filed Thursday in a Detroit federal court, the ACLU argues that the hospital’s policy against abortion, even when the mother’s life is in danger, violates the 1986 Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. The refusal of the hospital to terminate the pregnancies resulted in these women “hemorrhaging, contracting life-threatening infections, and/or unnecessarily suffering severe pain for several days”, according to the complaint.
The offense? The Catholic health care chain, which operates 86 hospitals in 21 states, does not perform abortions.
Trinity abides by the Ethical and Religious Directives of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) including refusal to perform abortions and tubal ligations in its hospitals. It requires doctor’s facility crisis rooms to give patients, regardless of their protection, with fitting medicinal screening and adjustment care on the off chance that they trust they are encountering a crisis wellbeing issue. That lawsuit was dismissed, is being appealed, and now the ACLU is “going right to the source of the care”, she said.
The ACLU also threatened action last month against a Grand Blanc Catholic hospital for refusing a seriously ill woman’s request to be sterilized during her scheduled C-section next month.
“The Ethical and Religious Directives are entirely consistent with high-quality health care, and our clinicians continue to provide superb care throughout the communities we serve”, the statement went on to say.
“Catholic hospitals have been well-positioned to take part in mergers”, she said, explaining that the majority of mergers happened after small, rural hospitals struggled to contend with quality standards mandated by the Affordable Care Act.
Catholic hospitals receive public money and almost one out of nine hospital beds in the U.S.is in a Catholic facility, according to the ACLU.
A federal judge in July tossed out an ACLU lawsuit against Muskegon, Michigan hospital Mercy Health Partners, a Trinity subsidiary, for repeatedly turning Tamesha Means away while she was miscarrying.
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The Directives are clear, however: “abortion … is never permitted” and “Catholic health care ministry is rooted in a commitment to promote and defend human dignity; this is the foundation of its concern to respect the sacredness of every human life from the moment of conception until death”. The ACLU is appealing the case.
