A major controversy has erupted in central Florida, in the town of Mount Dora, where an urologist, Dr. Jack Cassell, has posted a sign on the door of his office telling Obama supporters to go elsewhere for medical care.
A strong critic of the Health Care reform, Dr. Cassell claims that he is not denying anyone medical care from him, who wants it. He sees it as his right to make his position clear on the health care reform, and believes that very few people who have come to his office have turned away from walking in.
Congressman Alan Grayson, who is the Representative from Cassell’s district, is bringing a case to the Florida Medical Board and the American Medical Association against Dr. Cassell, as acting in a discriminatory manner against some of his patients, and others who might seek medical care from him.
He points out that the Hippocratic Oath and the American Medical Association Code of Ethics makes clear that a medical professional is not to use political viewpoints as a reason to refuse medical care to any of his patients.
Many would argue that this is a freedom of speech case, and certainly, in his role as a private citizen, Dr. Cassell has every right to express his views in any forum outside of his work place. But in his role as a medical professional at work, it is totally inappropriate and against medical ethics to do what he is doing.
Grayson is pursuing the idea of consequences for what Dr. Cassell is doing, and it seems appropriate that Dr. Cassell needs to agree to cease and desist in what he is doing at his workplace, and pursue it instead in other venues or even in running for public office to promote his views, if he sees fit.
Freedom of speech does not include the right to intimidate patients and imply denial of medical care, as much as it does not include the right to “shout fire in a crowded theater”. There is a time and place for such assertions of the First Amendment!