Continuing the close reading of the Complaint in Means v US Conference of Catholic Bishops.
One startling item is # 38, on page 6, in the sequence in which the Complaint describes the chain of events. This is about the second time the hospital sent Means home.
38 After Plaintiff’s temperature went down, MHP sent Plaintiff home again. At the time MHP sent Plaintiff home, Plaintiff’s treating physician suspected she had chorioamnionitis, a significant bacterial infection that can cause serious damage to a woman’s health, including infertility and even death. However, MHP did not inform Plaintiff of this possible infection.
Wow. The physician suspected Means had chorioamnionitis, and didn’t tell her and didn’t treat her. The physician didn’t even admit her.
That’s just staggering.
And yet – when a public health educator in Muskegon working on a federally funded public health surveillance project on infant and fetal mortality discovered the case along with four others, and brought them to the attention of MHP during a meeting with the Vice President of Mission Services of MHP, Joseph O’Meara, O’Meara was fine with the whole setup. Item 57, on page 8:
57 Mr. O’Meara explained to the public health educator that upon review of Plaintiff’s chart by a MHP physician, MHP’s decision not to induce labor was proper because Defendant USCCB’s Directives prohibited MHP from inducing labor in that situation.
A piece of shocking medical malpractice was “proper” because the bishops.
Items 69 and 70 on pages 10-11.
69 Directive 45’s prohibition of “material cooperation” with respect to the provision of pregnancy termination services directs Catholic health care services to refrain from informing patients about the availability of and/or need for pregnancy termination procedures if the fetus is not viable.
70 Directive 45 does not allow providers at Catholic health care services to inform patients about the availability of and/or need for pregnancy termination procedures if the fetus is not viable when the pregnancy itself places the pregnant woman at risk of harm.
The directives don’t permit them even to inform. And some hospitals, and some networks of hospitals, obey the directives. The directives are there, and it’s dangerous and reckless to assume that no hospitals obey them.
73-77 on page 11 spell out the unsettling organizational structure.
73 Defendant Stanley Urban is the current Chair and Defendants Robert Ladenburger and Mary Mollison are former Chairs of Catholic Health Ministries (“CHM”), an unincorporated foreign entity that required MHP to adhere to the Directives.
74. The decision that MHP would adhere to Defendant USCCB’s Directives was made by CHM in the Eastern District of Michigan.
75. CHM is not an incorporated entity under the laws of any state in the United States or any foreign country.
76. As Chairs of the unincorporated entity CHM, Defendants Urban, Ladenburger and Mollison are personally and/or vicariously liable for the acts and omissions of CHM.
77. In 2000, CHM was established as a public juridic person by an agency within the Vatican under “canon law,” a recognized foreign legal system.
A recognized foreign legal system is telling US hospitals what to do, including not treating or even informing women who need emergency abortions.
This has got to stop.
But Ophelia, what about all those 10 Commandment Lawsuits that won’t get filed or Bigfoot photos that won’t get debunked if we concentrate on getting religion out of medical provision?
Not to mention all those photoshops that won’t get shopped, forum posts that won’t get posted, tweets that won’t get tweeted, Facebook groups that won’t fill up with ragey posts and comments and photoshops – no you’re right, you’re totally right, it’s hopeless. I don’t know what I was thinking.
Urban, Ladenburger and Mollison better start endowing eternal cemeteries like Cardinal Dolan did in Milwaukee or else they could be spending some big bucks for lawyers and possible damage claims.
If these people go to prison or suffer significant financial damage, it might at least serve as a chilling effect on the willingness to serve as an agent of a foreign legal system.
Somewhat whimsically, don’t we tend to call those “spies” or “terrorists”?
And thanks, Ophelia Benson, for continuing to follow this in such detail!
I don’t, either. You’re wasting sacred posts.
This happened to me. I was admitted with PROM, bleeding etc at 20 weeks. Was told that I was miscarrying and that I would have to provide it with a proper burial (ie, the Catholic hospital would consider the miscarriage a birth and I would have to look after the remains – I was made to sign papers to this effect at 3AM hours after arriving at the hospital in shocked distress). I did not go into labor, however, and next thing the doctor practiced the or” of the “and/or” mentioned above. He told me that I was definitely going to lose the pregnancy and that “some women” don’t want to wait for the inevitable and want to hurry things along and if I was one of “those women” he would have to transfer me to the university hospital to have that taken care of. He did not mention anything about my condition (except, God only knows why some babies are lost) but simply put it o me that if I was the type of woman who did not want to put up with a little inconvenience like waiting for my fetus’s natural death, well he would not take a hand int hat but he law forces him to tell me my options. Because it was a dearly wanted pregnancy, I said, I don’t want to do that – maybe the pregnancy will survive! So then I was told it would be better to stay at Catholic hospital because at the unviersity one I would be surrounded by strangers who might push me to abort.
I stayed put because I stupidly trusted the doctor.
Much later I found out that I had a placental abruption and it was life-threatening. I was never given this important information at the time when I needed it to make an informed decision.
I am furious about that dehumanizing treatment to this day.
That was about 20 years ago. This is not new in the USA, unfortunately. I am so glad that it is finally being discussed. I hope like hell that there are prosecutions. It is time for this shit to be OVER.
I am appalled by these doctors. there needs to be more ethics training in med school and residency. I know I did not get enough case examples of ethical problems in med school. It is also malpractice not to tell a patient about certain risks, such as DEATH