Statement of the North Carolina Medical Society on Senate Bill 20 – Care for Women, Children, and Families Act

Statement of the NCMS on

Senate Bill 20 – Care for Women, Children, and Families Act

(RALEIGH) — The North Carolina Medical Society opposes the numerous policy changes proposed by SB20, which create new restrictions on patient access to comprehensive reproductive health care.

The North Carolina Medical Society supports our members specializing in women’s health and the fundamental belief that medical decisions should be made between a patient and their physician/clinician. SB 20 interferes in the doctor patient relationship. SB20 is administratively burdensome and proposes a complex set of regulations that are not evidence-based and will impede patient access to medical care. In addition to limiting access to safe clinical care, this measure will also create new causes of action against those who are striving to provide their patients with medical care that is in the best interest of the patient. SB20 creates unnecessary additional administrative burdens for physicians at a time when access to care is a challenge to many in our state and when physicians are reporting unprecedented levels of burnout.

We urge the General Assembly to reconsider the decision to vote quickly on SB 20 to allow time for thorough and careful consideration of this most complicated and life-changing issue. Moving forward with these changes will undermine the clinician-patient relationship, impose new and punitive penalties on clinicians, potentially discourage physicians from practicing in North Carolina, and compromise patient access to safe care.