HHS Sec. Leavitt Tries to Define Contraception as Abortion, Then Pretends He Didn't

Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt acknowledges in his second blog post on the issue, that traffic has increased on his blog as people respond with concerns to the HHS proposal that redefines contraception as abortion.

Readers will recall that when the draft regulation was first leaked, RH Reality Check experienced our highest traffic weeks, Speaker Nancy Pelosi's web site actually crashed, and many sites saw increased readership. In his first post on the topic last week, Leavitt attempted to redirect the conversation away from contraception, claiming a redefinition of contraception as abortion was not his or the draft regulations' intent.

In his second blog on the issue, posted yesterday, the word contraception doesn't even appear. As is often the case with anti-choice politicians, Leavitt only wants to talk about abortion to stir people's emotions. Leavitt quotes Mary Jane Gallagher, President of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, writing:

So, according to Ms. Gallagher's ideology, if a person goes to medical school they lose their right of conscience. Freedom of expression and action is surrendered with the issuance of a medical degree.

No Secretary Leavitt, what Ms. Gallagher was talking about was medical ethics, not ideology. In my post last week, I quoted Jon O'Brien, President of Catholics for Choice:

While some have pointed to Catholic teaching to support the imposition of ever-more restrictive refusal clauses, they do not reflect the Catholic position. Catholic teaching requires due deference to the conscience of others in making decisions--meaning that health-care providers must not dismiss the conscience of the person seeking care. If conscience truly is one's "most secret core and his sanctuary [where] he is alone with God, whose voice echoes in his depths," as the Catechism states, how can anyone, or any institution for that matter, justify coercing someone into acting contrary to her or his conscience?

The goal of any reasonable conscience clause must be to strike the right balance between the right of health-care professionals to provide care that is in line with their moral and religious beliefs and the right of patients to have access to the medical care they need. Within the field of medical ethics, the accepted resolution to a conflict of values is to allow the individual to act on their own conscience and for the institution (the hospital, clinic or pharmacy) to serve as the facilitator of all consciences.

The question, Sec. Leavitt, is not about people checking their beliefs at the door. Medical ethics and morality dictate that it is the patient, the person in need of help, sometimes in crisis, whose conscience and beliefs matter in the moment they are seeking health care services. Medical professionals who have a problem dispensing contraception should not choose professions where they will be asked for contraception, or as a commenter on another blog wrote, "if this is about people living their religious convictions, then they should have enough faith not to choose work that conflicts with their convictions." There is plenty demand for medical professionals in fields in which practitioners will never come in contact with people seeking contraception.

But this isn't about any individual's right to refuse service, as the Secretary suggests. As Leavitt demonstrates in his second blog, the politics of abortion are not new to him, he knows how to play the game. Congress won't be taking up any more legislation of significance, and the clock is ticking on the Bush Administration. The only thing left for the Bush Administration to do on abortion will be done from HHS through rules and regulations. Leavitt knows it, knows how to play it, and is spinning wildly without addressing the very serious threats to preventing abortion through access to contraception that these regulations pose.