Birth Control

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Reports & Toolkits | Duty First: Towards Patient-Centered Care and Limitations on the Right to Refuse for Moral, Religious, or Ethical Reasons

March 31, 2011

This article provides an overview of the harm to patients caused by refusals to provide health care based individuals’ or institutions’ religious, moral or ethical beliefs.  The article argues that any law or policy allowing health care providers to refuse services to patients must emphasize providers’ duty to their patients.   The article examines existing refusal laws, and describes how they contravene medical ethics and undermine established principles of quality medical care.  The article concludes with recommendations for heightened patient protections which limit the burden of refusals currently imposed on patients.

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Legal Briefs & Testimony | Complaint filed with Arizona Attorney General’s Office in Hospital Merger Case

March 29, 2011

In April 2010, the Sierra Vista Regional Health Center in southern Arizona entered into an affiliation with a Catholic health system, and agreed to stop providing comprehensive reproductive health services.  The Center filed this complaint with Arizona Attorney General’s Office, alleging that the Board violated its duty to the community when it entered into a deal that limited access to health care.  We are pleased to report that while the complaint was pending, the Board of the Hospital decided to end the affiliation, restoring comprehensive health care access to this rural community.

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Fact Sheet | HHS Rescinds Portions of Health Care Refusal Rule that Threatened Women’s Health

February 18, 2011

The Department of Health and Human Services partially rescinded a regulation entitled, “Ensuring That Department of Health and Human Services Funds Do Not Support Coercive or Discriminatory Policies or Practices in Violation of Federal Law,” which went into effect under the Bush Administration.  These changes restore critically important protections for patients.

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Fact Sheet | Oppose the Unnecessary and Harmful “Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act”

January 26, 2011

The Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act (H.R. 217), also known as the Pence bill, imposes extreme and unnecessary restrictions on Title X funding that would threaten women’s access to essential primary health care and family planning services.

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Legal Briefs & Testimony | Testimony by Judy Waxman, Before the Institute of Medicine Committee on Preventive Services for Women

November 16, 2010

Testimony of Judy Waxman before the Institute of Medicine's panel on what women's preventive services to include at no-cost sharing in all new health plans as defined by the Affordable Care Act.

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