SUPREME COURT WON'T HEAR DRUG-TEST APPEAL

Washington: The U.S. Supreme Court refused Monday to hear a second appeal
from a South Carolina hospital in a lawsuit over now-illegal hospital drug
tests on pregnant women.

The Supreme Court ruled two years ago the tests, once given at the Medical
University of South Carolina in Charleston, violated Fourth Amendment
protections against unreasonable search and seizure. Some women who tested
positive for drugs were arrested from their beds shortly after giving birth.

The Medical University of South Carolina had asked the Supreme Court to
consider the narrower issue of whether the women knew their urine was being
screened for drugs, as part of a 1989 policy designed to stop the crack baby
epidemic.

The answer will help determine damages in the case.

The justices, without comment, declined. The case now will return to a
federal district court in Charleston, where a jury will rule on damages.

After ruling two years ago the policy, since abandoned, was an unreasonable
search, the justices had ordered a lower court to consider the hospital's
argument that the women consented to the tests. A divided panel of the 4th
U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last year that most of the women who
sued did not know they were being tested.

The appeals court ruling could be interpreted as requiring patient consent
for every test or procedure.

Robert Hood, the attorney for the city of Charleston and the hospital, said
that would endanger laws requiring "public health care workers, as well as a
whole spectrum of others such as social workers and teachers, to report
evidence of suspected crimes such as child abuse or domestic violence."

The women's attorney, Priscilla Smith with the Center for Reproductive
Rights, said patients need to be aware of tests run on them. A different
ruling "would violate fundamental norms of medical ethics, undermining the
doctor-patient relationship and threatening public health" because some
pregnant women would not seek care.

In 1993, 10 women sued MUSC, medical school officials, the city of
Charleston and local law enforcement authorities, saying the testing was an
unconstitutional search.

A federal jury in Charleston rejected the women's claim and, in 1999, the
4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the drug tests, saying the law
allows searches without a warrant when the government shows a special need.

The appeals judges said the policy was a valid effort to reduce crack
cocaine use by pregnant woman. Police arrested about 30 maternity patients
and charged them under the state's child endangerment law while the policy
was in effect.

However, the U.S. Supreme Court later reversed the appeals court, saying the
testing violated the Constitution.

The case is Charleston v. Ferguson, 02-1528.