U.K. medical students want right to refuse abortions

Almost half of 700 British medical students surveyed believe they should have a right to refuse treatment on moral, religious or cultural grounds.

Three-quarters of the Muslim medical students and over half of Jewish and Protestant students felt they should be entitled to make conscientious objections to carrying out such treatments as abortions, prescribing the pill or treating drug-affected or drunk patients, Australian Associated Press reports.

About 60 per cent of Muslim students said they would refuse to perform an abortion because of failed contraception, compared with 23 per cent of all the students surveyed, The Telegraph in London reports.

About one-fifth of all the students wanting the right to refuse treatment cited religion as the key factor, AAP says.

Students were surveyed anonymously from four different British universities. The study, published Tuesday in a respected British Medical Journal publication, said students were presented with 11 procedures including abortions, prescribing birth control, treating patients high on drugs or alcohol and intimate examinations of patients of the opposite sex.

Asked if they thought doctors should be entitled to object to any procedure with which they had a moral, cultural or religious disagreement, 45.2 per cent agreed, 40.6 per cent disagreed and 14.2 per cent were unsure, the Telegraph report says.

Of all the objections raised, 44.1 per cent were for non-religious reasons, 19.7 per cent were based on religion and 36.2 per cent were both.

The students were least willing to treat patients requesting abortions, whether the requests were for a congenitally malformed fetus after 24 weeks or an underage girl who was  raped, The Telegraph reports.

About one in 10 objected to treating a patient who was drunk or high on drugs, while 5.4 per cent preferred not to carry out an intimate examination of a patient of the opposite sex.

Dr Sophie Strickland, of King George Hospital in Essex, who conducted the research, said the results may have implications for women's access to abortion services in the future.

"The Department of Health has issued statistics showing that, although there are an increasing number of abortions taking place in the UK, fewer doctors are willing to perform them."

Under General Medical Council (GMC) guidelines, doctors can refuse treatment that is against their principles, but them must refer the patient on to a colleague who will not object.

The findings prompted the Australian Medical Association to voice its concern about the attitudes of doctors in that country.

"(The survey) is a litmus test for the future in that they didn't survey doctors, they surveyed students," Australian Medical Association president Dr Steve Hambleton said, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.

"It may be that we need to focus some of those ethical issues in medical courses given the increase in the number of female students and there being more of a mix of race and religion (among medical students)."

Dr Hambleton said he believed instances of Australian doctors refusing to treat patients based on conscientious objections were rare, but did happen.

The survey was published in the Journal of Medical Ethics and follows media reports in the U.K. a few years ago about Muslim students refusing to attend lectures or answer exam questions on alcohol-related issues.