In response to Leslie Cannold’s article (refer below) a number of letters were published in The Age, including one from the Atheist Foundation of Australia.
CATHOLIC-RUN HOSPITALS
Published November 4, 2009
Bigotry against women
THANK you Leslie Cannold for highlighting the outrageous situation whereby women are excluded from comprehensive medical services at taxpayer-supported Catholic hospitals without proper disclosure of doctors’ religious biases.
This is another example of religious bigotry against women — opposition to sex education in schools, contraception and abortion rights disadvantages women, all because of some people’s interpretation of old texts. It is time our social attitudes, legislation and tax dollars supported conclusions and services based on rational thought, compassion and evidence.
The Federal Government’s lack of concern is disgraceful. If people believed what they wanted to as a personal matter but did not impose those beliefs on others, there would be no need for atheists and other freethinkers to say: “Enough is enough.”
- Tanya Smith, Atheist Foundation of Australia, Maitland, SA
Published November 4, 2009
Free, secular health care
ON PLACEMENT at the Mercy last year, I was disturbed to come across the problems described by Leslie Cannold. A woman who had just had her seventh baby requested to have her tubes tied and was refused. An in-service with the Centre against Sexual Assault ground to a halt when staff pointed out they could neither provide nor inform women of their rights to emergency contraception if they presented following a rape.
Midwives told me that they had been asked to speak quietly, or not at all, about contraception with new mothers, even though many women erroneously think breastfeeding will protect them from accidental pregnancy. The Catholic Church is too compromised to be able to offer women’s health services. It has no right to tell women that their imaginary friend in the sky knows best about when, how many and how often we have children.
I have no problem with Catholics attending Catholic hospitals. However, the rest of us should have access to free, secular health care based on science, not vague parables written thousands of years ago.
I call on governments to withdraw funding from these hospitals unless they provide the full range of care available at other excellent public hospitals such as the Women’s.
- Elvira Griffith, registered nurse, Fairfield [Vic.]
Published November 4, 2009
Offering the best care for women
IN RESPONSE to Leslie Cannold’s article (“Women are being failed by our hospitals”, Comment & Debate, 3 November), one in 11 babies in Victoria is born at Mercy Hospital for Women, a Catholic community provider of care. Our aim is to provide the best compassionate care to women and their families at all times and in all circumstances.
Very few, if any, hospitals in Australia provide “all” services. Patients are transferred to where they may receive further consultation or where services are best provided. As a Catholic hospital, we do not undertake abortion or sterilisation, or support euthanasia. Should victims of rape present, they are referred to a specialised sexual assault service.
Throughout history, religiously inspired hospitals, whether Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist or other, have been integral to the health care of almost every society. They still are.
As a Catholic organisation, we care equally for people of all faiths and no faith. And we employ on the same basis. We exist to provide care and, in a pluralist society, we continue to play an important role. Or should we be excluded because of a particular ideology? In our diverse society, pluralism is more encompassing than Ms Cannold’s personal view.
- John Ballard, CEO, Mercy Health, Richmond [Victoria]
Published November 4, 2009
The right to beliefs
LESLIE Cannold says: “Catholics, and other faith-based groups in Australia, are entitled to their moral beliefs and to the expression of these through the institutions they run.” If that is what she believes, why is she attacking them for holding these beliefs and operating according to what they are? And why is she insisting that they are run according to her beliefs?
I think it is called duplicity.
- Roger Marks, Drouin [Vic.]
