This always makes me HULK Mad. Do your damn job.
An Oklahoma emergency room doctor refused to provide emergency contraception to a 24-year-old female rape victim because the medication violated the health provider’s personal beliefs, a local CBS News affiliate reports. The hospital also denied the victim a rape kit, noting that it had no appropriate nurse on staff to administer the test.
“I will not give you emergency contraceptives because it goes against my beliefs,” the doctor allegedly told the rape victim and her mother, Rhonda. “She knew my daughter had just been raped. Her attitude was so judgmental and I felt that she was just judging my daughter,” Rhonda told the news station.
This “conscience clause” business is totally mind-boggling. If your perverted morality supersedes your duty and oath as a medical professional to provide perfectly legal medical treatment, maybe you should recalibrate your career choice.
Fortunately, the young woman in Oklahoma ended up going to another hospital, where she received the medication she needed and the rape kit. But she would have had to go to two hospitals either way, since budget cuts have forced the state to resort to a system of rotating Sexual Assault Nurse Examiners (SANE nurses).
First, do no harm. Second, deny needed treatment. Third, embarrass a traumatized victim. Fourth, send her to another hospital. Fifth, realize you did harm. Sixth, quit.