Should a person you disagree with get medical treatment?

Increasingly the answer from doctors is “No, let them die.”

We saw that a lot during COVID, and still do when it comes to providing life-saving treatments such as transplants. A person could have natural immunity from COVID and still be rejected for transplants if they don’t also get vaccinated and boosted.

Now, though, wrongthink is a good enough reason for doctors to refuse to give treatment to patients, which is a pretty big violation of basic medical ethics. Not that medical ethics mean much anymore–after all, our highest public health authorities fought hard to ensure that nobody was able to provide fully informed consent for COVID vaccines.

🚨BREAKING🚨

A breast cancer patient in Oregon has reported she was dropped by her health clinic for "transphobia" after criticizing a trans pride flag in the reception area.

Marlene Barbera had been a patient at the Richmond Family Clinic for 12 years.https://t.co/iVOeQ18psr

— REDUXX (@ReduxxMag) August 2, 2023

This is what dedication to “compassion” looks like. In the same way that giving lobotomies and eugenics were compassionate.

A woman undergoing treatment for breast cancer has been dropped by her medical clinic based on “hurtful remarks” they allege she made about the “LGBTQ community.” Marlene Barbera, who is scheduled for a mastectomy later this month, had commented on a trans pride flag she had seen in the waiting room of the Richmond Family Medicine Clinic in Portland, Oregon.

Speaking to Reduxx, Barbera says she had written her Doctor a note last year objecting to the presence of a trans pride flag she had seen in the clinic’s reception area.

“I wrote my Doctor a MyChart message all about how offensive, I, as a gender critical woman, found political messaging in a healthcare setting,” Barbera says. People who align themselves with ‘gender critical’ views often reject gender ideology, specifically as it conflates the subjective definition of “gender identity” with the reality of biological sex. Most also take issue with the impact gender ideology has had on the rights of women and girls.

The fact that a medical clinic is propagandizing controversial political issues is, in itself, a red flag. Using political positions as a reason to deny medical care doesn’t even qualify as a red flag; it should be a basis for yanking medical licenses.

I remember reading about how doctors worked assiduously to save Lee Harvey Oswald’s life, despite the fact that they despised him and what he had done. In the practice of medicine, you don’t decide who to treat based on your own moral judgments. It is as unethical as a lawyer throwing a case because he dislikes his client. It isn’t done.

Rejecting a cancer patient for treatment is the equivalent of telling them the world would be better off dead. Of course, the patient should run far and run fast against such an awful doctor, but so should every other patient. Clearly, the doctor sees themselves as a judge, jury, and executioner.

Vinay Prasad has written about this problem, including his experience with residents arguing with patients over politics. In the case, he described the patient as a cancer patient making the difficult decision to discontinue care. In the midst of such a traumatic decision, an MD decided to lecture the patient about how evil Donald Trump was.

What is WRONG with these people? They are deranged and be drummed out of medicine.

My latest Substack revisits something that happened to me in the hospital in 2016

I didn't realize at the time, but it was the start of naked politics among doctorshttps://t.co/KydHP1kjxY pic.twitter.com/JWsqBVJ9yd

— Vinay Prasad MD MPH (@VPrasadMDMPH) July 15, 2023

Our professional classes have decided to go to war with anybody they dislike, up to and including censoring them, jailing them, and wishing them dead.

These are the people we are supposed to trust to care for us and run our society.

No.

OHSU’s website is a lesson in irony. Go there and the banner says they are “Building an OHSU Where All Feel Welcome.”

“All” apparently include only people they agree with on everything.