Health and Human Services created the new Division of Conscience and Religious Freedom last year with the primary goal of defending religious freedom.(Photo: Shutterstock)

A new rule from the Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights not only provides more backing to health care workers choosing to refuse to participate in services that don't line up with their religious beliefs, it also sharpens the thrust of that office's mission.

The new Trump administration rule, according to NPR, “gives health care workers leeway to refuse to provide services like abortion, sterilization or assisted suicide, if they cite a religious or conscientious objection” and “is designed to protect the religious rights of health care providers and religious institutions.”

Related: Is religious liberty PPACA's latest victim?

In a statement, OCR director Roger Severino said, “This rule ensures that health care entities and professionals won't be bullied out of the health care field because they decline to participate in actions that violate their conscience, including the taking of human life.” When Severino created the new Division of Conscience and Religious Freedom last year, he “made it clear that defending religious freedom was his primary goal,” the report says.

HHS has also changed the mission statement of the OCR in the past week to reflect that focus.

As pointed out by NPR, the original mission to provide equal access to health care and “improve the health and well-being of people across the nation” has been amended to one with more of  a law enforcement and civil rights focus that “protects exercise of religious beliefs and moral convictions by individuals and institutions.”

Existing protections that allow a health care provider to opt out of certain services have been expanded under the new rule, even if they only participate in a tangential way in those services—meaning, Fatima Goss Graves, president and CEO of the National Women's Law Center, said in a statement, that “This rule allows anyone from a doctor to a receptionist to entities like hospitals and pharmacies to deny a patient critical—and sometimes lifesaving—care.”

The New York Post reports that San Francisco has already brought suit against the Trump administration over the rule, with City Attorney Dennis Herrera filing the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for Northern California hours after it was issued. Herrera argues that HHS exceeded its statutory authority when it created the rule, and that it prioritizes religious beliefs over patient care.

And The Hill reports that the state of California may also bring suit, with California Attorney General Xavier Becerra saying, “It's 2019, not 1920. We won't go back to the days when Americans seeking healthcare faced discrimination simply because they were female or LGBTQ. California stands ready to take any and all legal action to prove the Trump administration wrong.” Patient advocacy groups also criticized the ruling, terming it legalized discrimination that would make it hard for patients to access needed care.

Religious groups applauded the move from the OCR.

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