In the past, forced sterilizations violated the autonomy of vulnerable women. Today, measures intended to protect such women from the abuses of the past may in fact hamper their autonomy in a different way.
Restrictions on employer-based health insurance coverage of medical services or treatments, whether motivated by religious prohibitions, political objections, or concerns about cost, degrade quality of care and undermine the patient-clinician relationship.
Qualifying conscience protections for institutions with requirements that they minimize hardship caused to the patient would prevent religious institutions from acting as a choke point on the path to services.