Medical Council Faces Legal Action Over Guidance Statement

New Zealand Doctors Speaking Out with Science (NZDSOS) is taking legal action against the Medical Council of New Zealand (MCNZ).

This action concerns the now revoked Guidance Statement, 'COVID-19 vaccine and your professional responsibility' issued to all doctors in April 2021.

The case is being heard in the Wellington High Court on 23 and 24 September, 2024.

The Guidance Statement expected doctors to be vaccinated (unless medically contraindicated). It stated doctors should discuss the benefits of vaccination with their patients, specifically omitting to remind doctors of their obligations to discuss risks, uncertainties and alternatives as part of informed consent.

Spokesperson for NZDSOS, Dr Alison Goodwin, said some doctors were facing disciplinary proceedings in the form of Voluntary Undertakings, Professional Conduct Committees, Performance Assessment Committees or Health Practitioner Disciplinary Tribunals.

“They had their Annual Practicing Certificates suspended for challenging the government’s COVID response, despite the MCNZ not having received complaints from patients, or providing any evidence that patients or the public were harmed.

“The MCNZ has acted as though its Guidance Statement had the legal status of a 'Standard' and used it as the basis for many of these actions.”

The Guidance Statement also contained an ambiguous phrase: ‘..that there is no place for anti-vaccination messages in professional health practice…’

This has been used as a basis to discipline doctors who asked questions, raised concerns, and considered that the public was not being given the full story.

The MCNZ has still not clarified what an 'anti-vaccination message' is, particularly in the context of informed consent where risk-benefit assessments will be different for each person.

The NZDSOS case asks the court to declare that the Guidance Statement was invalid as a 'Standard' against which doctors could be investigated and that any action taken in reliance of it is ultra vires.

“It is our view that the Statement did not have the status of a 'Standard', and could and should not have been used by the MCNZ in the way it was.

“This is a significant case because this Statement changed the profession of medicine by overriding a number of rights of both doctors and members of the public.

"It prevented medical professionals from speaking and sharing professional medical opinions, and prevented members of the public from receiving important information," said Dr Goodwin.

“We are also seeking a declaration that doctors were, and are, legally able to pre scribe long-standing, safe, approved medicines (like ivermectin) as long as the requirements for informed consent are fulfilled.

Through the Guidance Statement, the MCNZ was effectively practicing medicine by recommending all medical practitioners receive a novel medical treatment (i.e. covid vaccination).

The Statement did not document any consideration of the Bill of Rights Act or the Health and Disability Commission Code of Rights, nor any risk-benefit assessment.

The doctors taking this action are standing up for the rights of all New Zealanders, to be fully informed and to refuse medical treatment.

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