The Tennessee Senate has passed a bill
that would allow counselors to refuse to treat patients and instead
refer them to another professional due to religious beliefs.
ABC News reports that the bill, which passed 27-5 and was sponsored by
Republican Sen. Jack Johnson, would allow medical professionals to defer
care based on “sincerely held religious beliefs.”
The medical professional could then refer the patient whose issues or
requests were at odds with the doctor’s religious beliefs, to another
medical professional who did not object to treating the patient.
The bill came about as a response to the Supreme Court’s gay marriage
decision, and is one of a number of new proposals that aim to provide
for the religious freedom of clergy, businesses, state officials, and
medical professionals.
However, some are opposed to the bill.
Jennifer Pizer, a senior attorney for the gay rights group Lambda Legal, said that the bill misses the point.
"This kind of a bill confuses pastoral counseling with mental health
care," Pizer said in a phone interview from Los Angeles. "The reason
mental health professionals are licensed and held to professional
standards is to protect patients who are seeking mental health care and
not seeking pastoral or religious counseling."
Republican Sen. Steve Dickerson also disagrees with the bill.
"When you choose to go into the healing arts, you give up a certain
amount of latitude," Dickerson said. "If you choose to become a
counselor or choose to become a doctor, you treat whoever comes through
your door."
Johnson, who sponsored the bill, however, claims that the new bill is
simply reverting back to what the law stated before a 2014 change in the
American Counseling Association’s code of ethics restricted the
religious freedom of counselors.
"I'm not aware of a problem that existed prior to the amended code of
ethics in 2014," Johnson said. "All we're doing is reverting to that
code of ethics. It seemed to work very well for many, many years."
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