A Challenge to Racial Politics in Medicine

The diversity, equity and inclusion bureaucracy has injected progressive politics into many corners of the private economy, but its role in medicine is especially pernicious. Now a lawsuit is challenging whether California can force doctors who teach continuing medical education courses to also teach racial politics.

Under a 2019 California mandate, all continuing medical education courses in the state after 2022 must include a discussion of “implicit bias.” This is the notion that doctors supposedly harbor racist views they don’t realize they have, and thus must be taught to recognize and admit them. All such courses must include lessons on “how implicit bias affects perceptions and treatment decisions of physicians and surgeons, leading to disparities in health outcomes,” or “strategies to address” the unintended bias.

Iranian-born opthalmologist Azadeh Khatibi and anesthesiologist Marilyn Singleton are challenging this California mandate. The doctors say the implicit-bias training isn’t relevant to the medical topics the doctors cover in their continuing-education classes, and that disparities in care can’t be attributed to implicit bias.

The lawsuit (Khatibi v. Lawson), brought with the medical group Do No Harm and the Pacific Legal Foundation, says the implicit-bias mandate amounts to compelled speech, violating the First Amendment right of the teachers. California “cannot condition a speaker’s ability to offer courses for credit on the requirement that she espouse the government’s favored view on a controversial topic,” the lawsuit says.

California doctors are required to complete 50 hours of continuing medical education every two years to renew their license. All courses must now include the racial bias training to qualify for credit, and must present the government’s preferred messaging.

None of this is needed to fight actual discrimination by race, which is illegal under California’s Unruh Act and various federal laws. Doctors and hospitals can also be sued if there is evidence of racial discrimination.

California’s medical-education mandate is about compelling teachers to enforce a political message that doctors are racist no matter what they think or do. This is pernicious to social comity, and we’re happy to see doctors calling it out for its free-speech implications.