Lambda Legal and the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association Praise the California Medical Association For Affirming Equal Treatment for All Patients

(Los Angeles, Tuesday, September 20, 2005) — In papers filed with the California Court of Appeal in San Diego, the California Medical Association has asked to withdraw its friend-of-the-court brief and has submitted a new brief with Kaiser Permanente opposing discrimination in medical practice. “As the largest AMA state affiliate, CMA is a very influential medical organization in California and throughout the country,” said Jennifer C. Pizer, Senior Counsel in Lambda Legal’s Western Regional Office in Los Angeles. “When they originally sided with the doctors in our case I was very troubled to think that they would support behavior toward a patient that violates our state’s professional standards and civil rights law. We are gratified that in their new brief they make clear that discrimination against individuals for medically irrelevant reasons like sexual orientation and marital status is not only bad medicine for individual patients, it is bad public health policy for California.” The papers were submitted to the California Court of Appeal in San Diego in Guadalupe (“Lupita”) Benitez’s lawsuit against her former infertility doctors who, based on their fundamentalist Christian religious beliefs, refused to inseminate her at a critical juncture in her treatment because she is a lesbian. CMA had previously filed a brief and two clarifying documents supporting the physicians, but changed course and joined the brief with Kaiser Permanente, the health maintenance organization that serves over six million California patients and is a national leader in culturally competent care for lesbian and gay patients. “...Physicians who offer a given service to the public may not decline patients because of race, color, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, or other bases which constitute invidious discrimination,” the CMA and Kaiser Permanente brief reads. “These standards are applicable regardless of the religious or ethical beliefs of the physician.” “We’re pleased to see this joint brief from CMA and Kaiser because it describes plainly what’s best for patients. GLMA has understood CMA to have good anti-discrimination standards and to deal responsibly with LGBT patients. Their new brief is consistent with their long-term commitment to all patients and their good relationships with the LGBT community, as well as with the AMA’s ethical policies against discrimination,” said Joel Ginsberg, Executive Director of the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association. By joining Kaiser Permanente’s brief, CMA joins the nation’s largest HMO in opposing invidious discrimination in medicine. Background: Benitez’s lawsuit was thrown out of state court initially, but she won an appeal two years ago that said that patients can sue health care providers who discriminate based on their sexual orientation, and federal law does not exempt health care providers from state civil rights laws. Last fall, Benitez won a legal ruling in the trial court saying that doctors in a for-profit medical group must comply with California’s antidiscrimination laws and treat all patients equally, whatever the doctors’ personal religious beliefs may be. The doctors asked the court of appeal in San Diego to review that ruling before trial and the court ordered both sides to submit briefs.