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A health care provider’s religious beliefs should never determine the care a patient receives. Yet religious exemption laws – like the federal Weldon Amendment – allow health care providers like hospitals, doctors, nurses, and health insurance companies, to do just that – refuse to treat a woman seeking an abortion because of religious or moral beliefs. These laws allow religious beliefs to override a patient’s health needs and put women’s lives and health at risk, which is why voters are more likely to support an elected official who opposes religious exemption laws.
The Weldon Amendment is a federal law that has been attached to the annual federal spending bill for labor, health and human services, and education programs since 2005. It allows health care entities – including hospitals, health insurance plans, individual doctors and nurses – to refuse to provide abortion, cover abortion, pay for abortion, or refer for abortion. There are no provisions in the law to protect patient access to abortion services. If a state or local government wants to do something to protect women’s access to abortion, like pass a law requiring hospitals to provide referrals to women who need an abortion, the Weldon Amendment could be used to threaten the state with losing millions of dollars of federal funding. A patient’s health should always come first but the Weldon Amendment allows a provider’s religious beliefs to override a patient’s health needs.
Religious exemption laws like the Weldon Amendment put women’s lives and health in danger. Because of religion, some hospitals have turned away women seeking abortion or information about abortion, even when the woman’s life is in jeopardy. In some instances, hospitals have refused to treat a woman whose miscarriage is threatening her life. These practices put religious beliefs over patients’ needs and they can – and have – resulted in infertility, infection, and even death.
The harms created by religious exemption laws have a disproportionate impact on those individuals – including women of color and low-income women – who face increased barriers to accessing abortion.
A March 2017 nationally representative survey conducted on behalf of the National Women’s Law Center shows that sixty-one percent of voters oppose religious exemption laws.
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The survey also showed that voters are willing to hold federal elected officials accountable and are more likely to support officials for opposing religious exemption laws.
A patient’s health needs and individual circumstances should drive medical decisions, not a provider’s religious beliefs. Rather than passing laws that allow religious beliefs to dictate patient care, elected officials should be focused on ensuring that women receive the care that they need, including abortion. Safe, legal abortion is not only the law of the land, it is essential for women’s health and well-being and it is time to eliminate the Weldon Amendment.