Religion and medical neglect

Medical neglect

Medical neglect occurs when children are harmed or placed at significant risk of harm by gaps in their medical care. This is most likely to occur and to be recognized when families lack resources, commonly due to poverty, and when medical demands are high, such as with complex, severe, and chronic illness. A systematic evaluation of the probabilities for harm from gaps in care versus benefits from improved care will define medical neglect. A broad consideration of child, family, community, and medical system contributions to identified gaps will guide management. Special circumstances, such as lapsed immunizations, unremitting obesity, and medically motivated alterations in care, are often challenging for medical providers. Guidance for these specific situations is available from the American Academy of Pediatrics, and from the medical literature.

Freedom of conscience and health care in the United States of america: the conflict between public health and religious liberty in the patient protection and affordable care act

The recent confirmation of the constitutionality of the Obama administration's Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) by the US Supreme Court has brought to the fore long-standing debates over individual liberty and religious freedom. Advocates of personal liberty are often critical, particularly in the USA, of public health measures which they deem to be overly restrictive of personal choice. In addition to the alleged restrictions of individual freedom of choice when it comes to the question of whether or not to purchase health insurance, opponents to the PPACA also argue that certain requirements of the Act violate the right to freedom of conscience by mandating support for services deemed immoral by religious groups. These issues continue the long running debate surrounding the demands of religious groups for special consideration in the realm of health care provision. In this paper I examine the requirements of the PPACA, and the impacts that religious, and other ideological, exemptions can have on public health, and argue that the exemptions provided for by the PPACA do not in fact impose unreasonable restrictions on religious freedom, but rather concede too much and in so doing endanger public health and some important individual liberties.