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South Carolina Gov. McMaster signed medical-conscience law shielding only race from care-refusal discrimination

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster signed H4776, the Medical Ethics and Diversity Act, into law on June 17, 2022, after it passed the House 76-31 and the Senate concurred 23-13. The law lets medical practitioners, institutions, and payers refuse to provide or pay for any nonemergency health care service that violates their religious, moral, or ethical conscience, with its sole anti-discrimination carve-out protecting patients only on the basis of race. LGBTQ+ advocacy groups and roughly 50 health care professionals who had urged a veto warned the law would restrict access to care such as gender-affirming treatment and fertility services for same-sex couples.

Jurisdiction
South Carolina
Location
Columbia, South Carolina

Abuses documented

Actors

On June 17, 2022, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster signed H4776, the Medical Ethics and Diversity Act, into law after the bill passed the House 76-31 and the Senate concurred 23-13. The law grants medical practitioners, health care institutions, and health care payers a right to refuse to participate in or pay for any nonemergency health care service that violates their religious, moral, or ethical conscience. Its only anti-discrimination carve-out, Section 44-139-80, protects patients from refusal solely on the basis of race — sexual orientation and gender identity are not covered.

LGBTQ+ advocacy groups including the Campaign for Southern Equality and the Human Rights Campaign, joined by roughly 50 health care professionals who had urged McMaster to veto the bill, said the law functions as a license to deny care disproportionately needed by LGBTQ people, such as gender-affirming hormone therapy and fertility treatment for same-sex couples.

Why we recorded this

Equal access to health care regardless of a patient's identity is a basic civil-rights protection. This law lets medical providers refuse nonemergency care for religious or moral reasons while shielding patients from discrimination only on the basis of race, leaving LGBTQ+ patients seeking services such as gender-affirming or fertility care without a legal protection against refusal. This archive records when government policy creates a legal gap permitting differential treatment based on a protected characteristic.

Sources

  1. A235, R269, H4776 — Status Information — South Carolina Legislature primary accessed July 18, 2026
  2. SC medical ethics law prompts concern re: LGBTQ health care — Religion News Service (AP) secondary accessed July 18, 2026
  3. Protecting doctors' beliefs or enabling discrimination? S.C.'s new medical conscience law — South Carolina Public Radio investigative accessed July 18, 2026

See also