The slow climb up the Slippery Slope

"We live in a culture where more and more people are on opposite sides of these basic issues," said Manion, who has represented an ambulance driver fired after she refused to take a patient to a hospital for an abortion and a nurse transferred after she refused to provide morning-after pills.

"The so-called right-to-life movement in the United States has expanded its agenda way beyond the original focus on abortion," Uttley said. "Given the political power of religious conservatives, the impact a whole range of patient services could be in danger."

Thank goodness then for "religious conservatives".

More than a dozen states are considering new laws to protect health workers who do not want to provide care that conflicts with their personal beliefs, a surge of legislation that reflects the intensifying tension between asserting individual religious values and defending patients' rights.

About half of the proposals would shield pharmacists who refuse to fill prescriptions for birth control and morning-after pills because they believe the drugs cause abortions. But many are far broader measures that would shelter any doctor, nurse, aide, technician or other employee who objects to any therapy.

That might include in-vitro fertilization, physician-assisted suicide, embryonic stem cells, and perhaps even providing treatment to gays and lesbians.

Tying in gays and lesbians. Now that's quite an expansion of the downward
slope. I can only guess this might apply to injecting collected sperm into
lesbians, but shudder to think how it may apply to male homosexuals.

At least 18 states are already considering 36 bills.

The swell of propositions is raising alarm among advocates for abortion rights, family planning, AIDS prevention, gay civil rights and assisted suicide.

AIDS prevention? You got me there.