Good news for same-sex and unmarried partners!

[docorion]

Yesterday the President "directed the Department of Health and Human Services to prohibit discrimination in hospital visitation" on the basis of pretty much anything, but specifically including sexual orientation. Basically, he required HHS to craft regulations which would require hospitals which receive Medicare or Medicaid money (meaning pretty much all of them) to allow patients to designate anyone they wanted as a permitted visitor, and the hospital would be required to let them in.

This is almost certainly a direct result of the Lisa Pond/Janice Langbehn Miami debacle (NYT column on the issue, including a précis of the Miami case here) and related cases. This is, IMNSHO, a big deal for anyone who is the unmarried partner of anyone else, as well as the legally married same-sex couples out there.

I have on occasion worried about my standing in the event either of my partners had something bad happen to them. In general, Massachusetts is better about this than most places, but we aren't always in Massachusetts. Pleasantly, I'm a doctor, and know how to work the system, but that mostly means influence, not rights. So I am altogether pleased by this.

Should you be moved to do so, it might be useful to drop a thank you note to the President.