Woman Says Catholic Hospital Canceled Sterilization Surgery to ‘Protect Her Sacred Fertility’

Unchecked medical fascism is looking more and more like a bucket list in Tennessee. On Friday, a Catholic hospital in Nashville canceled a woman’s scheduled sterilization surgery because the hospital’s religious ethics oversight committee was concerned that it was failing its “duty to protect her sacred fertility.” Protect yourselves, freaks. 

A woman told NBC affiliate WSMV she was scheduled for a salpingectomy—or the surgical removal of her fallopian tubes—at Ascension St. Thomas on Friday, and was already waiting with an IV in pre-op when she was given the news.

“I’ve wanted to pursue sterilization since I learned that that was something that a person could do,” she said. “I’ve tried a lot of different options for birth control, none of them have worked for me.” She added that she never wanted kids, has a history of assault, and is worried about living in a state with one of the strictest abortion bans in the country. 

Tennessee passed the Medical Ethics Defense Act in April, so doctors and hospitals can now refuse care if it goes against their “moral, ethical, or religious view.” (So much for going against the Hippocratic oath?!) In July, one doctor in the state refused prenatal care to a pregnant woman because she was unmarried, which went against his “Christian values.”

It is confusing why a Catholic hospital would schedule an elective sterilization procedure in the first place, but the Ascension healthcare system is no stranger to legal trouble from denying women care. In 2024, they were found to have violated the EMTALA Act for delaying emergency medical care for a woman’s ectopic pregnancy in Texas. 

“The hospital wasn’t going to allow them to go through with it, because they had concerns about the implications of sterilizing a woman so young,” she said—though the outlet doesn’t specify her age. 

“I had spent a long time emotionally preparing, moving my schedule around it and just, you know, getting ready,” she continued. “Women I know with chronic health issues have always struggled to feel listened to by doctors. [But e]ven not having any like, chronic health issues, I’ve struggled to feel listened to by doctors.” 

The woman said the main reason she wanted to speak up about her story is that she didn’t want anyone else to go through a similar experience. So avoid Ascension hospitals, and honestly? Giving birth in Tennessee, if you can. 

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