A large cross sectional survey of U.S doctors, recently published in the Annals of Family Medicine suggests that non religious or atheist doctors are more likely to practice medicine among the poor than religious physicians, even though most of the world's religions encourage service among the poor.
According to the results of the survey, 31 percent of physicians who were more religious—as measured by "intrinsic religiosity" as well as frequency of religious service attendance practiced among the poor. Compared to this, 35 percent of physicians who described their religion as atheist, agnostic or none were practising among the underserved.
This goes against the popular myth of religious people being more altruistic and caring.
Read the news article and the original study.
