new england journal of medicine

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desperate man in silhouette sitting on the bed with hands on head

At Last! Establishment Pushback Against Puberty Blocking

Opponents of puberty blocking can no longer be denigrated as supposed religious fanatics or transphobic haters. Hopefully, the ultimate beneficiaries of this sea change will be the children whose bodies will not now become fodder in the well-meaning but ultimately destructive name of “gender affirmation.” Read More ›
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People raising fist with unfocused background in a pacifist protest against racism demanding justice
People raising fist with unfocused background in a pacifist protest against racism demanding justice

The Perils of Declaring Racism a ‘Public Health Emergency’

With COVID-19 apparently on the wane, the technocrats who eagerly seized upon the pandemic to justify hobbling American liberty now advocate declaring racism a “public health emergency.” Read More ›
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The symbol of the transgender in hands on a cardboard plate, covering (hiding) the face.
The symbol of the transgender in hands on a cardboard plate, covering (hiding) the face.

No NEJM: Blocking Puberty in Gender-Dysphoric Children Is Not Settled Science

Certain issues have been deemed by our betters among the elite as undebatable. One is climate change. But the fervor over that issue pales next to the attempt to prevent open debate about the propriety and safety of blocking the puberties of children diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Read More ›
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Birth Certificate for Live Baby Born
Birth Certificate for Live Baby Born

Not Identifying Sex on Birth Certificates Pushed in New England Journal of Medicine

The New England Journal of Medicine continues its hard swing to the woke left. Now, it has published an advocacy article that would remove sex designation as an identifiable factor on birth certificates. From, “Failed Assignments: Rethinking Sex Designations on Birth Certificates”: Assigning sex at birth also doesn’t capture the diversity of people’s experiences. About 6 in 1000 people identify as transgender, meaning that their gender identity doesn’t match the sex they were assigned at birth. Others are nonbinary, meaning they don’t exclusively identify as a man or a woman, or gender nonconforming, meaning their behavior or appearance doesn’t align with social expectations for their assigned sex. The idea is to move sex designation “below the line,” which allows for general statistical Read More ›

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Pistoia, Ospedale del Ceppo

Catholic Hospitals Under Attack

Catholic hospitals are under unremitting attack — from prestigious medical journals, media, and lawyers in courtrooms. The goal is to coerce these venerable institutions into replacing their faith-based methods of medical practice with secular moral standards that deny the sanctity of human life.  

A recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine — perhaps the world’s most influential medical publication — illustrates the threat to medical conscience rights. Ian D. Wolfe and Thaddeus M. Pope, two prominent bioethicists, fret that one in six U.S. hospitals is “affiliated with a Catholic health system.” This is a problem, in their view, because religiously-affiliated hospitals often “refuse to provide legally permitted health services on the basis of institutional belief structures.” The authors are referring to services like abortion, sterilization (absent a pathology), assisted suicide (where legal), and transgender sex reassignment surgeries that alter a body’s normal biological functions. Refusing such procedures, the authors claim, leads to “substantial risks for patient choice, patient safety, and the fundamental principle of autonomy.” 

Patient choice? Yes, sometimes. If a woman requests an abortion and the hospital says no, she is not getting what she wants. But safety? The Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services allow Catholic hospitals to refuse interventions that violate Church belief, but nonetheless require that all patients receive proper care. That includes providing “all reasonable information about the essential nature of the proposed treatment and its benefits; its risks, side-effects, consequences, and cost; and any reasonable and morally legitimate alternative.” In practice, this may also include referring patients to non-Catholic institutions. 

Worries over “safety” are more likely a deflection to mask anti-religious bigotry. Charles C. Camosy, associate professor of theological and social ethics at Fordham University, believes that in many circumstances, the motive for attacking Catholic medicine “is about raw power. Certain influential people don’t want certain [medical] choices denied, so they try to use their power make things the way they want them to be.”

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