Overview

• Joachim Volz launched an online petition on July 1 that has drawn over 150,000 signatures calling for an end to the hospital’s abortion prohibition
• The Westfalen-Lippe medical association has branded the Catholic operator’s service instruction unethical for allowing terminations only when a woman’s life is at risk
• The Archdiocese of Paderborn has defended its new shareholder agreement as expressly protecting life from conception to natural death
• A failed mediation preceded planned demonstrations in Lippstadt on the day the Labor Court Hamm hears arguments on August 8
• The court’s verdict will determine how religiously affiliated hospitals reconcile church doctrine with §218’s legal abortion exceptions