Health care denial or medical conscience? ACLU sues Ohio for letting doctors refuse care

A law that lets Ohio health providers refuse services that violate their religious or moral beliefs is being challenged in court not on its merits but on the way it was passed.

The "medical conscience clause" wasn't a freestanding piece of legislation. Instead, Republicans folded the language into Ohio's 2,400-page budget during final negotiations.

“The Healthcare Denial Law was snuck into an unrelated appropriations bill in the eleventh hour behind closed doors," ACLU of Ohio attorney Amy Gilbert said in a statement. "Our constitution’s single-subject rule serves an essential democratic purpose in placing concrete limits on the power of the General Assembly."

And the ACLU along with Equitas Health, are now asking the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas to toss the provision out.

"This discriminatory and vague amendment was snuck in at the last minute without any opportunity for the people of Ohio to discuss and debate its controversial language," according to a joint press release issued on Friday.

That's a different approach from the one Columbus attorney Zach Klein took earlier this month when he filed his own legal challenge to the conscience clause.

In his lawsuit, also filed in Franklin County, the city said it runs a women's health center that provided birth control, other reproductive services and vaccinations. If a city employee at that clinic opposed a procedure, "they can refuse it and we as a city can't do anything about it," Klein said.

More: Columbus sues state over law allowing medical providers to deny care based on 'conscience'

The two pages of the conscience clause added to House Bill 110 say that whenever these conflicts come up, "the medical practitioner shall be excused from participating."

Gov. Mike DeWine didn't see a problem with the language when he signed the budget bill in June 2021.

“People are not going to be discriminated against in regard to medical care," DeWine told reporters.

Doctors who object to abortions weren't performing them before the bill was signed, so DeWine felt this clause just put into law something that was already happening.

LGBTQ rights advocates, however, worry the clause makes it even harder for LGBTQ people–especially those younger than 18–to find mental health care.

More: Conscience clause increases barriers to mental health care for LGBTQ youth, advocates say

"The relationship between a patient and their medical provider is built on trust. This law puts that trust in jeopardy, further marginalizing the people who need our services most," Equitas Health Board Chair Kaarina Ornelas said in a statement. "The effects of this law are so chilling that our board of trustees has determined we can no longer wait."

Anna Staver is a reporter with the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau. It serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: ACLU, Equitas Health challenge Ohio law letting doctors deny care