Posted on 06/01/2006 7:20:27 AM PDT by 8mmMauser
This child does not suffer from a disability. He cannot live without the respirator, and will not improve.
Is your mother on a respirator? If she's not, then her situation resembles not at all the one detailed in the article.
No hyperbole there. Removing medical treatment from someone that needs it to live with the understanding that removing such care will kill them- that's killing them. It's really that simple.
About these hospitals: You're forgetting that Dr. Burke Balch had to negotiate for years to get that meager 10 day reprieve. Hospitals desired the ability to just remove treatment and kill people on the spot. They have no desire to allow time to let a patient move to another facility or they wouldn't enforce the pathetic, unreasonable 10 day rule. We have to obtain court orders to get more time in every case.
I don't agree that it's okay to kill terminally ill people. If they are terminal, let them die naturally. Why the big damn hurry?
I'm asking you where it stops. I'm pointing out the dangerous precedent so easily set when determining who should live and who should die based on physical/mental ability.
If the respirator is removed from this child, he will die naturally.
You said, in a previous post, that terminally ill people should be allowed to die naturally. That's what the hospital is doing in this case.
We were discussing Andrea Clark, not little Daniel.
Daniel is brain damaged. He's not terminally ill.
Daniel Cullen is the subject of this thread. That is who I meant. Ms. Clark was obviously terminal, as she died during the controversy over whether Hermann should find another hospital for her.
"And will not improve."
I'm not suggesting he will improve. I've never examined him nor am I qualified to do so, but I find it striking that you are so adamant about your "diagnosis." He will NEVER improve. How do you know?
I know of a little girl who doctors wanted to remove treatment from because they beleived she wouldn't improve--and she did improve significantly. She had no hearing or sight- and now has both. She was a brain-damaged preemie also and requires oxygen support.
You're putting a lot of faith in the opinion of doctors with economic interests. While I don't doubt that they are most likely correct in their prognosis, I wouldn't damn any hope for a miracle with the gusto and enthusiasm that you have for his inevitable demise.
Likewise, respirators are training tools for brain-injured patients and if given enough time and the right parts of the brain are still functional, the lungs will learn to breathe on their own again. True, that part of little Daniel's brain might not be functional, but the mere presence of a respirator does not equal brain death in many, many cases.
Google "Jason Childress" and "UVA" for just one example.
Do you oppose ever removing life support, even when a person is brain dead?
Each situation is subjective and I err on the side of life. I can't say I wouldn't ever remove life support, but I'm certainly not itching to pull the plug.
In this euthanasia-happy society, there are those that aren't making a determination on a case-by-case basis, but rather want to rid the world of poor people getting publicly-funded medical care, disabled people, ill people, people of certain ethnicities, religions and so forth.
Read Margaret Sanger's writings, listen to tapes by euthanasia pros and you'll see why I don't accept the opinions of economically-invested and ideologically-invested doctors at face value.
As I posted early in the thread, the Catholic Church has provided a moral framework for making these kinds of end-of-life decisions. Life is a great value, but it is not an absolute value, and there are other legitimate moral factors that go into deciding when life support may end.
Yes, and what was the clinical diagnoses? Cerebral cortex was completely gone, ritght? Remember, "liquidfied", "mush", "all turned to water". You know the drill.
However, what was the autopsy report on the Cerebral Cortex? I think it said "relativly intact" if I remember right. Oops, somebody made a boo boo.
Oh BTW, here is your deceased pal Dr. Cranford praising Terri in his examination before he recomended that she should be killed.
This is so wrong. I knew when these living will things started that it would lead to this. They pretend you have a choice, but actually you do not. They place no value on human life.
I defy you to show us where on this thread I said that Belcher's manifest unfitness was "justification for killing her child."
I'll be waiting.
Why do liberals always digress when they lose?
Hmmmmmmmmmm?
You seem confused. Does that happen to you a lot?
Perhaps it's your obsession that is blurring your ability to comprehend.
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