New York City, N.Y., May 10, 2016 / 15:21 pm
The American Civil Liberties Union's claims that Catholic hospitals are denying emergency care to pregnant women in the U.S. is not about healthcare – it's about forcing religious groups to perform abortions, critics say.
A recent ACLU report finds that one out of every six beds in the country's acute care hospitals is in a hospital with Catholic affiliations and that Catholic hospitals make up 15 percent, or 548, of the country's hospitals. The report claims that because these hospitals follow Church teaching in regards to reproductive care, they put women at risk.
All Catholic hospitals operate under the U.S. Bishops' Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, which ban abortion, sterilization, and emergency contraception or tubal ligations.
Marie Hilliard, the director of public policy for the National Catholic Bioethics Center, told the Guardian that if the directives are properly followed, a woman's life should not be at risk.