Overview
Conscience protections allow providers to opt out of delivering certain medical services to patients for moral or religious reasons. These protections have been a political football each time the White House has changed hands in recent years, and the same will likely be true in 2025.
Thanks to a June 13, 2024, US Supreme Court ruling, however, a new and important variable will be in the mix this time. In Food and Drug Administration v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, the Supreme Court articulated a much more absolute view of the conscience protections that federal law affords to providers to refuse to participate in the provision of certain healthcare services for personal conscience reasons than has previously been articulated in the text, legislative history, or judicial interpretation of the relevant federal statutes.
That ruling, combined with what we know about the first Trump administration’s position on this topic, may lead to a significant uptick in conscience-based opt-out requests from healthcare workforces. At the same time, the ruling may make it more difficult for provider organizations to address such requests without significant cost or liability exposure. The potential risks extend well beyond individual worker EEOC/Title VII claims for religious discrimination – they could impact providers’ past or future eligibility for various US Department of Health and Human Services administered funding streams (potentially including Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement).
Join our cross-practice panel for a thorough review of these developments and their potential impacts.
