Editor's note: When the original commentary below appeared in NEJM, we notified the Freedom2Care federal registry, the CMA-sponsored LinkedIn registry of members who want to keep updated on news and opportunities in federal public policy. Several members who responded to that request had their letters posted by NEJM; those letters are below the original commentary by Alta Charo.
The author's point seems to implicate antitrust concerns, at least by analogy. If enough physicians of a majority religion refuse to perform a particular procedure, it may become difficult to access. The flaw in the argument is that pro-life, practicing Christians are a tiny minority of the medical profession, which is overwhelmingly secular. Religious doctors simply don't have enough market power to deny controversial healthcare options to the public as a whole. I think the whole thing is a red herring, designed to mask the true objective: the complete secularization of medicine and all the learned professions. The eventual result will be a society where the religious will be marginalized into solely menial employment and be unable to obtain healthcare, legal services, etc., from providers who share their worldview.
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