CLF urges World Medical Association to continue support for physicians’ conscience rights
On May 28, 2021 CLF submitted its response to the World Medical Association’s (WMA) proposed amendments to the International Code of Medical Ethics (ICoME). Our submissions cautioned the WMA against the adoption of a statement in support of mandatory effective referrals in cases of conscientious objection.
The WMA is an international body of physicians whose aim is to ensure the independence of physicians and to work for the highest possible standards of ethical care in medicine. The WMA’s global influence on medical professional ethics is apparent in its history as well as its official relations with the World Health Organization and its 115 national medical associations members (though the Canadian Medical Association withdrew in 2018). The ICoME itself was originally adopted in response to the mass cruelties propagated prior to and during the Holocaust. It currently sets out 22 duties of physicians relating to the general practice of medicine, patients, and colleagues.
The WMA is proposing a significant revision of the ICoME, including a statement recognizing a physician’s duty to provide effective referrals in cases of conscientious objection. CLF cautioned against the inclusion of this statement among the proposed amendments, referring to the negative impact it could have on professional ethics and the rights of physicians and vulnerable persons. In particular, CLF highlighted how obligatory effective referrals undermine the WMA’s longstanding commitment to preserving the individual ethical independence of physicians.
CLF urged the WMA to recognize that mandatory effective referrals result in exclusion of conscience from medical practice. We also shared our concerns about the challenges mandatory effective referrals are presenting to physicians and disabled Canadians in Ontario in the wake of Bill C-7’s expansion of physician assisted suicide.
CLF is committed to pursuing justice for the vulnerable as well as the rights of health care professionals to practice in accordance with consciences. We are hopeful the WMA will join us in opposing obligatory effective referrals, especially in cases involving the intentional termination of human life.
“Respect for and accommodation of independent physician conscience is crucial to the continuation of medical practice as a fundamentally humanitarian endeavour, and not simply a technician’s trade. The WMA is uniquely positioned to influence this continuation in the face of an increasingly consumeristic and transactional view of medical practice. We urge the WMA to do so by restating its support for the accommodation of conscience, particularly in those cases where human life hangs in the balance.”
Further reading
Read about CLF’s recent submission to the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (May 14, 2021)