Source: San Diego Union Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle
Doctors in California must treat gays and lesbians the same as any other patient the state Supreme Court ruled Monday in a case that pitted case pitted religious freedom rights guaranteed in the constitution against California's strong anti-discrimination laws.

In a unanimous decision, the court rejected a San Diego County fertility clinic's attempt to use its physicians' religious beliefs as a justification for their refusal to provide artificial insemination for a lesbian couple.

Guadalupe Benitez sued her doctors at the clinic because they refused to perform a fertility procedure on her. Benitez wanted to have a child with her longtime partner, but the doctors at North Coast Women's Care clinic said their strong religious beliefs prevented them from doing the procedure for a lesbian.

At a May hearing on the case, an attorney for the doctors urged the justices to uphold what he called the "religious-liberty rights" of the physicians guaranteed under the state constitution.

The court, however, ruled today that doctors can't use their religious beliefs as a reason to refuse treatment to patients because doing so violates the state's anti-discrimination law, San Diego Union Tribune reports.

Today's ruling, three months after overturning California's ban on same-sex marriage, strengthened the state's law that prohibits businesses, including medical clinics, from discriminating against customers because of their sexual orientation, as well as their race, sex or religion. The court said religious beliefs do not excuse discrimination, San Francisco Chronicle reports.

The law "furthers California's compelling interest in ensuring full and equal access to medical treatment irrespective of sexual orientation," said Justice Joyce Kennard in today's ruling.

In language that would apply equally to abortions, Kennard said doctors who have religious objections to a particular procedure or treatment can refuse to perform it for any patient, but can't selectively reject gays and lesbians. She said they also have the option of referring a patient to someone else at the clinic who will perform the procedure, an option that wasn't available in this case.

Source: Court rules medical services can't be denied on religious grounds | San Diego Union Tribune
State Supreme Court says doctors must treat gays and lesbians | San Francisco Chronicle
Lesbian sued doctors who denied her fertility procedure | San Diego Union Tribune