Helen Bamford
18 August 2007
Cape Town — A gay woman making inquiries about fertility treatment at Cape Town's Vincent Pallotti Hospital was curtly told "we don't help people like you" by a nursing sister.
Dr Natasha Distiller, an academic at the University of Cape Town's humanities department, who later had a baby boy, said she was stunned and hurt by the comment.
"I said to her, 'Isn't that unconstitutional?' but she just said 'Phone the Cape Fertility Clinic'."
Distiller, who has been with her partner Lisa Retief, a software developer, for five years, said what was ironic was that her gynaecologist, also a gay woman, was the one who referred her to the fertility clinic.
Weekend Argus was told by a source in the medical fraternity that "practically half the doctors" at the former Catholic-owned hospital were gay.
The hospital is now a member of Life Healthcare, which is one of the largest private hospital groups in South Africa.
Distiller said a hospital obviously had a right to practise freedom of religion but questioned what would happen if it had been a race or gender issue as opposed to a gay one.
"It makes me feel that gay people are still not considered fully human," she said.
The couple, from Pinelands, who were married in May, were finally helped at the Claremont-based Cape Fertility Clinic.
"The guy who helped us was also religious and a Muslim but he was incredibly helpful.
"He told us that it was Vincent Pallotti's policy not to offer treatment to gay couples."
This was confirmed by Sue Scholtz, spokeswoman for the hospital, who said that in accordance with the terms and conditions of Life Healthcare's purchase agreement with the Catholic Church (the previous owners of Vincent Pallotti Hospital), they were restricted from offering fertility treatment to gay couples or single women, or to perform termination-of-pregnancy procedures "except where medically necessary".
"We respect that single women and unmarried or gay couples may wish to have a baby of their own, and their right to seek fertility treatment and that there are other centres in Cape Town offering fertility treatment to them," she said.
Distiller said they had considered going to court over the matter.
"But we just wanted a baby," she said, adding that they were hoping to get Retief's name on the birth certificate as a co-parent, which could be a first for South Africa.
Melanie Judge, advocacy manager at the Pretoria-based gay organisation OUT, said that even though the hospital was a private health facility it was still bound by the Constitution and should not discriminate against people on the basis of their sexual orientation.
She said a recent study had found that 6% of people in Gauteng and 5% in KwaZulu-Natal had reported being refused health-care treatment because of their sexual orientation.
"The reality is that gay and lesbian people are experiencing overt homophobia at health-care facilities around the country."
Judge said the Ministry of Health should have a zero-tolerance policy when it came to any acts of discrimination against gay and lesbian clients.
"The law is clear about our rights and that includes being able to get access to them. Any attempt to block those rights could be contested in a court of law."
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2007 Cape Argus. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
