Catholic hospital ditches "pro-life" rhetoric to avoid malpractice lawsuit payout

A Catholic health care provider in Iowa says a 35-week-old fetus isn't a legal "person"

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UPDATE (4/19): The Catholic hospital says it will no longer use the argument that a fetus is not a person for the sake of malpractice insurance caps.

In a written statement issued Friday, Bob Ritz, president and CEO of MercyOne, stated “we are heartbroken that our belief that human personhood begins at conception would ever be called into question. As a Catholic health system, the sanctity of life is not just a belief we hold; it is the foundation of every action we take.

“While the motion (to limit damages) was accurate from a purely legal standpoint, it has caused confusion and concern. That is why we have asked our counsel to withdraw the motion with respect to MercyOne. No courtroom argument should ever cast doubt on the deeply held Catholic values that guide MercyOne.

“At MercyOne, our Catholic identity is not something we set aside. It is central to who we are. It shapes how we serve and care for people in their most sacred and vulnerable moments. We are more than a health system. We are a health ministry. Our commitment to respect the dignity of every human life, from the very beginning, is unwavering. And it will continue to guide us in everything we do.”

…

How seriously do Catholics take their own belief that life begins at conception? Not that much, apparently, when there’s cash on the line.

According to the Iowa Capital Dispatch, the parent company of a Catholic hospital called MercyOne is arguing in court that a fetus is not a “person” when calculating costs in a medical malpractice lawsuit.

A doctor at a Catholic hospital (image via Adobe Spark)

In 2021, when she was 34 weeks pregnant, Miranda Anderson was transferred to MercyOne’s Obstetrics Emergency Unit because of complications. She was evaluated and monitored… but sent back home after two days. When she went to see her doctor a few days after that, they discovered the fetus was no longer viable.

Miranda and her husband Landen then sued MercyOne and Catholic Health Initiatives-Iowa (which oversees it) for medical malpractice, arguing that doctors should have recognized the situation and recommend that she deliver the baby early, when it was still alive. Both MercyOne and CHI deny any wrongdoing. If the lawsuit is successful, they could be on the hook for a lot of money.

But this is where it gets interesting.

An Iowa law that was passed in 2017 said that non-economic damages in cases involving the “personal injury or death” of a “patient” should be capped at $250,000… unless there was really good reason to raise that amount—like “a “substantial or permanent loss or impairment of a bodily function.” That makes sense. If you’re forced to suffer the rest of your life due to a doctor’s mistake, you may be entitled to a larger amount.

Should the loss of a pregnancy count under that exemption? If so, the Catholic hospital could be paying a lot more than $250,000 to the Andersons if a jury believes that it was the hospital’s negligence that led to the death of the fetus.

But the Catholic hospital’s lawyers say the death of a fetus shouldn’t be included under that exemption:

They argue the Iowa Legislature did not intend for the loss of a baby prior to delivery to be included within the exemption and that Anderson’s lawyers are attempting “to put words in the Legislature’s mouth … There is no case law, and plaintiffs cite to none, finding ‘loss of pregnancy’ is a ‘loss or impairment of a bodily function.’”

They point out that, in 2023, the legislature amended the law so that “loss of pregnancy” was included in the list of really good reasons to raise that cap… which implies it was not an exemption when Anderson lost her baby.

To put it another way, the hospital is saying the loss of a fetus is not the same as the loss of a baby, according to Iowa law, so there should be a clear limit on how much they might have to pay out.

In recent court filings, attorneys for CHI and MercyOne argue that “finding an unborn child to be a ‘person’ would lead to serious implications in other areas of the law.” They also argue the Andersons’ unborn child should not be considered a “patient” for purposes of calculating damages.

“There is no statute or binding case law finding an unborn child to be a ‘patient’ under the law,” attorneys for the hospital have told the court, citing an Iowa Supreme Court ruling in a 1971 case that held “there can be no recovery (of damages) on behalf of, or for, a nonexistent person.”

To be clear, it’s not like the Catholic Church is making this argument. Lawyers for a Catholic hospital are. Those are different groups and the Church doesn’t have control over what these private lawyers do. This is more about the hypocrisy of a Catholic hospital, not the hypocrisy of the Catholic Church.

But the headlines write themselves.

None of this should be surprising. In fact, this exact same company has done this before. In 2006, a Colorado woman named Lori Stodghill was pregnant with twins when she began feeling sick. Her on-call doctor didn’t answer his pager when she was admitted to the hospital and she died later that night. Her husband later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Catholic Health Initiatives saying that while his wife’s death may have been inevitable, the fetuses could have been saved if the hospital had performed an operation.

The hospital argued in court, however, that the lawsuit should be dismissed because Colorado law didn’t count fetuses as people, therefore they couldn’t be victims of “wrongful death.”

The Archdiocese of Denver condemned that legal argument, saying “No Catholic institution may legitimately work to undermine fundamental human dignity.” But they couldn’t actually do anything about it. This was a legal issue, not a theological one.

You have to wonder, though, what obligations a Catholic institution has when it comes to Catholic beliefs.

The Catholic Church believes life begins at conception—that’s why abortions are “gravely contrary to the moral law”—but if there’s money involved, suddenly, they have no problem separating a fetus from a newborn as if they’re two distinct entities? When it comes to a possible conflict between the stated law and their own principles, these Catholic administrators are all too eager to blame the lawmakers for a lack of clarity than admitting their religious beliefs equate a fetus with a human child even if that might mean writing a larger check.

It brings to mind a less serious and far more amusing example of how the status of fetuses can mess with otherwise straightforward laws. A few years ago, a Texas woman was driving alone on the highway in a lane meant for high-occupancy vehicles (meaning there had to be at least two passengers in the car) when she was pulled over and given a ticket. She insisted she was following the law, though, because she was pregnant.

That ticket was eventually tossed out after a judge agreed with her logic. Because Texas.

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