Catholic hospital administrators argued they shouldn’t be held responsible after one of the hospitals under their control followed the bishops’ policies and refused to provide proper information and medical care to a woman in the middle of a miscarriage. Tamesha Means was 18 weeks pregnant when her water broke, and she rushed to the only hospital in the area for treatment.
Unfortunately, it was a Catholic hospital, and because of the bishops’ rules, the hospital didn’t tell Means that the pregnancy was doomed and that the safest course was an abortion. The hospital sent her home — not once, but twice — while she was in excruciating pain and developing an infection. Only once she began to deliver during her third visit did the hospital start providing care. Tamesha sued, and the hospital administrators argued that because of their religious beliefs, her case should be thrown out. The judge agreed, but neither Tamesha nor the ACLU is giving up. We have filed an appeal and will keep fighting to prevent other women from being denied appropriate medical treatment when they go to the hospital.
3. There is no such thing as a life-saving abortion
The families of the 650 women who die each year of pregnancy-related complications would beg to differ with the bishops on this one, as would major medical organizations. But, the bishops nevertheless used this argument against a proposal that would require federal contractors to provide their employees with health insurance coverage for life-saving abortions. The bishops said the universe of abortions necessary to save a woman’s life “comprises an empty set.”
