Doctors in Arkansas will soon be able to deny LGBT+ patients medical treatment ‘based on religious objections’

Critics say ‘dangerously broad’ bill paves the way to further anti-LGBT+ discrimination in medicine

Doctors in Arkansas will soon be allowed to deny medical services due to moral or religious objections after the governor signed a bill that critics said would have devastating effects on LGBT+ patients and others. 

On Friday, SB 289 — otherwise known as the Medical Ethics and Diversity Act — was signed into law by Governor Asa Hutchinson, who said in a statement: “I support this right of conscience so long as emergency care is exempted and conscience objection cannot be used to deny general health service to any class of people.”

SB 289 was scheduled to go into effect later this summer, providing doctors with the discretion to refuse treatment based on religious, moral or ethical grounds, even when such treatment is a medical requirement. Critics have described the bill as “dangerously broad” and said the legislation would allow healthcare workers to deny nonemergency services, as well as prescriptions for antiretrovirals, birth control or even hormone treatments for trans patients. 

The American Civil Liberties Union’s Arkansas director Holly Dickson said in a statement after the bill was passed: “Making it easier to deny people health care isn’t just wrong, it’s dangerous.”

“This bill is dangerously broad,” she added, “encompassing any kind of care that someone might object to on moral or religious grounds.”

The legislation is just one of several bills seen as a wave of anti-LGBT+ bills making their way through the Arkansas legislature and other states across the country. A day prior to passing SB 289, Mr Hutchinson signed a law banning transgender women and girls from competing in school sports teams that match their gender identity. 

“This law simply says that female athletes should not have to compete in a sport against a student of the male sex when the sport is designed for women’s competition,” the governor said in a statement. “As I have stated previously, I agree with the intention of this law. This will help promote and maintain fairness in women’s sporting events.”

Another bill expected to pass next week would ban gender confirmation surgery for minors. 

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Mr Hutchinson has taken an aggressive stance against LGBT+ rights, arguing in 2015 that his state should not have to recognise same-sex marriages following the historic Supreme Court ruling that made marriage equality the law of the land. He then instructed schools a year later to ignore federal guidance allowing transgender students to access bathrooms consistent with their gender identity. 

The latest legislation signed into law on Friday was opposed by major expert medical agencies, from the American Medical Association to the American Academy of Pediatrics. 

More than 50 percent of LGBT+ patients have reported experienced some form of health care discrimination, according to a recent Lambda Legal survey.