To participate in a lethal injection is to occupy the medical role and use medical training for a purpose that is not part of the goals of medicine and that harms the recipient of treatment.
If employees of religious institutions whose consciences conflict with those of their employers were to be granted legal protection for positive claims of conscience, the religious freedom of institutions within which they work would be gravely compromised.
With good planning and good will, medical professionals’ right of conscience and patients’ rights to controversial services can be both protected and accommodated.
Physicians working in correctional systems face many ethical dilemmas and professional challenges in providing health care for incarcerated adolescents.
Although the U.S. Supreme Court has decided that physician-assisted suicide is a matter of states' rights, there are many ethical and legal issues still unresolved for physicians.