Catholic Hospital Under Fire for Denying Life-Saving Treatment to Pregnant Woman

A pregnant woman who was denied a life-saving medical procedure at a Catholic hospital is fighting back with the aid of the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed a formal complaint on Wednesday.

The woman, Jessica Mann, of Flushing, Mich. (pictured above with her family), has a life-threatening brain tumor and was advised by her doctor to undergo tubal ligation (get her tubes tied) when she has her scheduled C-section — tentatively scheduled for Friday — as any future pregnancies could be fatal. But the Catholic Genesys Hospital in Grand Blanc refused multiple times to allow the procedure, citing religious directives that the sterilizing procedure is “intrinsically evil,” despite the fact that it has granted exceptions to patients in the past.

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“We’re taking the fight to the state agency that governs the hospital because it’s their job to make sure women like Jessica get the care they need,” said Brooke Tucker, attorney at the ACLU of Michigan, in a press release. “Religious directives have no place in hospitals, especially because they end up harming the very women they should be serving.”

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The complaint has been filed with the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs, which oversees the licensing and regulation for entities in Michigan, and it’s unclear whether a lawsuit will soon follow. “The complaint is essentially a call for the agency to investigate wrongdoing on part of the hospital,” an ACLU spokesperson, Allison Steinberg, tells Yahoo Parenting. “We’ve not yet identified next steps, but we’ll continue to fight for Jessica and all women to access the care they need.”

Genesys Hospital provided the following statement to Yahoo Parenting: “As a Catholic healthcare system, we follow the ethical and religious directives of the Church. Beyond that, we can’t comment on this patient’s particular case.”

But, Steinberg says, “Hospitals serve the public and should not hold religious directives above best medical practices or decisions that should be made between a doctor and patient. There’s no room for Catholic bishops in that equation.”

The three Mann kids, who will soon welcome a baby sibling. (Photo: ACLU)

Mann, who is 37 weeks pregnant with her fourth child, said through an ACLU statement, “I am very close to giving birth and instead of being excited, I’m terrified because my hospital turned me away, and I’ve had to go find a new doctor and hospital with little time to get them up speed on my complicated medical history and health risks.”

From the Hobby Lobby Supreme Court decision in 2014 to the ongoing effort to defund Planned Parenthood, her case is just the latest example of religion dictating the level of reproductive care afforded to women. Earlier this month, the ACLU announced it was suing Trinity Health Corporation, one of the country’s largest Catholic health systems, for cases similar to Mann’s, and for its “repeated and systematic failure to provide women suffering pregnancy complications with appropriate emergency abortions as required by federal law.”

And in July, the ACLU of Illinois began pursuing a bill, already passed by the Senate, that would require all healthcare institutions in the state to inform patients of any medical-treatment limitations based on a provider’s beliefs. It was inspired, in part, by mom Angela Valvanis, who had planned on having tubal ligation at the time of her C-section, only to be denied at the last minute by her Catholic hospital.

“The Catholic bishops are seizing an opportunity to control the health care we all pay for, and they’re being wildly successful,” Monica Harrington, the co-chair of Washington Women for Choice, told Mother Jones in an article called “Do Bishops Run Your Hospital?” which outlined the many ways religion is dictating healthcare decisions that reach far beyond abortion.

Between 2001 and 2011, the number of American hospitals affiliated with the Catholic Church grew 16 percent, according to a report by the ACLU and MergerWatch, a nonprofit that tracks religious healthcare mergers. And 10 of the 25 largest nonprofit hospital systems in the country are Catholic, while Catholic hospitals care for one in six American patients. Catholic hospitals follow healthcare directives (on everything from miscarriage to terminal illness) handed down by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, or else face possibly losing their Catholic affiliation.

In Mann’s case, the 33-year-old suffers from having benign brain tumors that can lead to other medical issues and are under regular monitoring. Because of this, her last pregnancy was treated as high-risk, and she had to undergo a C-section while under full anesthesia. With this latest pregnancy, she was advised by her doctor to make it her last, and that she should have her tubes tied to possibly safe her life.

“You know, it’s never easy to hear that. But I have accepted it,” Mann told the Washington Post in September, when news first broke that her hospital had refused her special request for the procedure, made in May. “I talked it over with my husband. We want me to be around. That’s the biggest thing.” Mann knew that Genesys had tightened its policy around tubal ligation recently, and that it would require a special medical exception, which had been granted before. But hers was turned down.

Now, with less than a week left before her due date, Mann is scrambling to gather insurance documents and referrals to find the care she needs elsewhere. It’s left her and her family in a difficult and frightening position.

“Instead of just feeling excited, we’re scared,” wrote husband James Mann in an essay for Refinery 29 in September. “Hospitals should offer the best medical practices possible, and they should let their patients make decisions in the best interests of their health and wellbeing with their doctors. Religious directives made by nonmedical professionals have no place in that picture. My children and I need Jessica. She’s the anchor in our family. Without her, we just wouldn’t be complete.”

(Top photo: ACLU)

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