What is conscientious objection in ethics?
Conscientious objection – the refusal to perform or participate in an activity associated with a professional role due to a conflicting moral or religious conviction — is a longstanding legal and ethical issue in health care, outlined in The Hastings Center’s Bioethics Briefings chapter, “Conscience Clauses, Health …
What is an example of conscientious objection?
Examples include, refusal to offer termination of pregnancy, especially late term termination, to women who are legally entitled to it and refusal to provide reproductive advice and help to gay couples, single women, or others deemed socially unacceptable.
What is conscientious objection in religion?
What is conscientious objection? Conscientious Objectors: These are persons who, by reason of religious, ethical, or moral belief, are “conscientiously opposed to participation in war in any form.” These people may be discharged from military service. They are exempt from military service, in the event of a draft.
What is a conscientious objection in health care providers?
1.2 A conscientious objection occurs when a doctor, as a result of a conflict with his or her own personal beliefs or values, refuses to provide, or participate in, a legal, legitimate treatment or procedure which would be deemed medically appropriate in the circumstances under professional standards.
Why is conscientious objection accepted?
The more the patient’s health is compromised without the treatment, the less acceptable the refusal to provide treatment is. The right to conscientious objection is grounded in the need to protect the doctor’s moral integrity, not in a right to communicate one’s moral views to patients.
Why would someone be a conscientious objector?
A conscientious objector is an “individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service” on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, or religion. In some countries, conscientious objectors are assigned to an alternative civilian service as a substitute for conscription or military service.
Why is conscientious objection in medicine so controversial?
Critics cite the supremacy of patient autonomy and the professional duty of a physician as reasons to oppose conscientious objection. On the other side, those in favor stress that the morality of the physician is an integral part in the doctor-patient relationship and should not be ignored.
What are the limits of conscientious objection?
There are legal limits to conscientious objection. Laws in some jurisdictions unethically abuse religious conscience by granting excessive rights to refuse care.. In general, healthcare providers owe duties of care to patients that may conflict with their refusal of care on grounds of conscience.
What is the principle of conscientious objection?
Abstract. Conscientious objection involves essentially an agent’s refusal to comply with an authoritative standard or rule that applies to him because doing so entails betraying one or more of his deepest commitments.