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California Catholic Nursing Homes may be Forced to Allow Assisted Suicide
LifeSiteNews ^ | 2/26/07 | Hilary White

Posted on 02/26/2007 4:10:34 PM PST by wagglebee

SACRAMENTO, February 26, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Well known bioethics author, Wesley J. Smith, warns in an article posted to the weblog of First Things magazine, that a pending bill in California could threaten the lives of vulnerable elderly and ill patients in nursing homes and hospice care.

Assembly Bill 374, says Smith, under the rubric of “choice” will force in-patient hospice facilities and even Catholic nursing homes to permit assisted suicide. The proposed legislation, he writes, exempts only acute-care hospitals.

While euthanasia advocates claim the changes to the law are only small matters of “tweaking” existing statutes, Smith warns that the result is a piece of coercive legislation that will threaten the lives of patients, undermine the philosophical foundation of hospice care and threaten the autonomy and even the existence of Catholic care facilities.

“If A.B. 374 becomes law, Catholic and other religiously oriented nursing homes will be forced to choose between shutting down, selling, or cooperating in assisted suicide.”

“A.B. 374,” Smith writes, “is patterned generally after the law in Oregon, though the coercion about which I write is not found in the current Oregon law or a concurrently introduced assisted-suicide legalization bill in Vermont, and is an attempt to force most medical and nursing facilities to cooperate in the assisted-suicide regime.”

Smith points to the sections of the bill, 7198 (b) and (e), to be added to the California Health and Safety Code should the legislation pass.

7198 (b) reads: “No professional organization or association, or heath care provider, may subject a person to censure, discipline, suspension, loss of license, loss of privileges, loss of membership, or other penalty for participating or refusing to participate in good faith compliance with this chapter.”

Subsection (e) reads: “Notwithstanding any other provision of law, a general acute care hospital, as defined in subdivision (a) of Section 1250, may prohibit a licensed physician from carrying out a patient’s request under this chapter on the premises of the hospital if the hospital has notified the licensed physician of its policy regarding this chapter.”

As a lawyer with years of experience deciphering legal loopholes in bills related to bioethics issues, Smith asserts that the specific exemption of acute care hospitals as the only place where assisted suicide may be stopped on site, means that the legislation intends to force other types of facilities to allow the practice.

“The legislation must be construed to require that all other health-care facilities cooperate with assisted suicide ¬whether or not they have religious, moral, or philosophical objections,” he writes.

Read the full text of Assembly Bill 374:
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/asm/ab_0351-0400/ab...

Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Bill Would Authorize Assisted Suicide By Any Other Name in Arizona
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/jan/07011706.html

New Assisted Suicide Bill Introduced in Hawaii Legislature
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/jan/07013004.html



TOPICS: Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: catholic; euthanasia; moralabsolutes; prolife
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To: LtdGovt
I read some of the other comments. It's not so simple and straightforward if the government gets the church hamstrung with funding. What a mess. I'm not blaming the church for not having the foresight in accepting government funding. Everything is happening so fast. To further muddy the waters, there are catholics who don't take the teaching seriously anyway.

I could be wrong but fear I'm not that this has already been going on with catholic priests/institutions in the Chicago area for a long time now, probably in my own area as well.

21 posted on 02/26/2007 5:08:27 PM PST by Aliska
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To: Aliska

They can always opt to refuse government funding, if this is a very important issue for them.


22 posted on 02/26/2007 5:09:32 PM PST by LtdGovt ("Where government moves in, community retreats and civil society disintegrates" -Janice Rogers Brown)
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To: Chode
that said, if one by chance DOES want to, simply say no and PAY THE FINE!!! what are they gonna do... close the place down???

In fact yes they would likely do just that. Again I do not agree with it but I have worked in nursing homes. They would first pull the Administrator's License. If the B.O.D. failed to correct next they would decertify the facility and likely close it. Yes it's government doing blackmail.

23 posted on 02/26/2007 5:11:51 PM PST by cva66snipe (Kool Aid! The popular American favorite drink now Made In Mexico. Pro-Open Borders? Drink Up!)
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To: LtdGovt
They can always opt to refuse government funding, if this is a very important issue for them.

That would be a wise move likely their only choice in the matter and even then with Cali laws??? They still may try and force the issue on the church.

24 posted on 02/26/2007 5:13:57 PM PST by cva66snipe (Kool Aid! The popular American favorite drink now Made In Mexico. Pro-Open Borders? Drink Up!)
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To: LtdGovt

That's true, but what if it causes them to have to shut down? I'm just putting it out there, not being argumentative. It's something that a lot of us have faced/will have to face in our personal lives as well as in society as a whole.


25 posted on 02/26/2007 5:23:38 PM PST by Aliska
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To: cva66snipe

PS. We have a fine regional heart center/regular hospital that is non-catholic and a fine catholic hospital. There have already been problems about trying to force the catholic hospital to do things they refuse to do. So far so good, but how long?


26 posted on 02/26/2007 5:25:30 PM PST by Aliska
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To: Aliska

That would be very sad. But I hope that the Governor will pressure them to at least provide an exception for medical facilities that are based on religion.


27 posted on 02/26/2007 5:26:47 PM PST by LtdGovt ("Where government moves in, community retreats and civil society disintegrates" -Janice Rogers Brown)
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To: LtdGovt

I would hope so, too, under freedom of religion. I'm not that confident it's going to hold up across the board though.


28 posted on 02/26/2007 5:29:41 PM PST by Aliska
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To: Aliska
PS. We have a fine regional heart center/regular hospital that is non-catholic and a fine catholic hospital. There have already been problems about trying to force the catholic hospital to do things they refuse to do. So far so good, but how long?

Hard to say. The best hospital we've {my family} dealt with is a Catholic hospital. Actually my wife and I were married there 21 years ago. For a while it had some problems even to the point I had to take my wife out of the E.R. because the attending ER doctor refused treatment. It was over what I discovered later an adverse medication reaction he insisted was an acute mental issue despite the fact she lost consciousness under his care. You can not fake COMA. Like I said in another post always be ready to act. They tried to take the say of her care out of my hands and place it in the hands of the state.

I found her unconscious in an exam room slumped over in her wheelchair. had words with the ER Doc he still refused treatment so I took her elsewhere. I also wrote a letter after it was all over to the Chief Of Staff who had treated my wife before. It hasn't happened again either.

29 posted on 02/26/2007 5:36:09 PM PST by cva66snipe (Kool Aid! The popular American favorite drink now Made In Mexico. Pro-Open Borders? Drink Up!)
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To: cva66snipe
Image hosted by Photobucket.com but they won't have to, because the Church will prolly tell the goonverment that they will CLOSE DOWN before they bown down to them.
30 posted on 02/26/2007 5:44:22 PM PST by Chode (American Hedonist ©®)
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To: Chode
but they won't have to, because the Church will prolly tell the goonverment that they will CLOSE DOWN before they bown down to them.

True but sooner or later the churches are going to have take on the government to regain control of their hospital systems. I'm not Catholic nor is my wife but they seem to be the only mainstream church left that actually keeps an active oversight of hospitals using their denominations name.

I once worked in a nursing home associated with a mainstream Protestant denomination and it was as far removed from the church as it could be except a 2 minute daily devotional. The facilities business ethics left a lot to be desired.

31 posted on 02/26/2007 5:53:53 PM PST by cva66snipe (Kool Aid! The popular American favorite drink now Made In Mexico. Pro-Open Borders? Drink Up!)
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To: cva66snipe
Image hosted by Photobucket.com didn't they try almost the exact same thing forcing queer adoptions on the Church??? don't remember how that turned out.
32 posted on 02/26/2007 6:08:26 PM PST by Chode (American Hedonist ©®)
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To: cva66snipe

ever been here??? http://oldsnipe.com/SnipeBegin.html


33 posted on 02/26/2007 6:12:55 PM PST by Chode (American Hedonist ©®)
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To: Chode
didn't they try almost the exact same thing forcing queer adoptions on the Church??? don't remember how that turned out.

I think it was in another state not certain though and the Church closed down the program IIRC. I may be wrong on that one though. Maybe somebody with a better memory knows.

34 posted on 02/26/2007 6:16:09 PM PST by cva66snipe (Kool Aid! The popular American favorite drink now Made In Mexico. Pro-Open Borders? Drink Up!)
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To: wagglebee

It's called the golden rule.

State has the gold you must follow the rules.

Best way to change this problem is not to vote for collectivist next time when there is an election.

Easy choice would be to refuse Gov. money, the Nursing Homes would probably go belly up but tough love is necessary sometimes when holding onto your core convictions.


35 posted on 02/26/2007 6:27:38 PM PST by rollo tomasi (Working hard to pay for deadbeats and corrupt politicians.)
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To: LtdGovt
If they refused government funding, then the majority of patients would leave and the facility would shut down as most seniors rely on Medicare/Medicaid/Social Security as their source of income.

Because the facilities take these funds, they are obligated to follow the rules. The piper calls the tune 100% of the time

36 posted on 02/26/2007 6:31:42 PM PST by SoftballMominVA
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To: 2ndMostConservativeBrdMember; afraidfortherepublic; Alas; al_c; american colleen; annalex; ...


37 posted on 02/26/2007 6:44:04 PM PST by Coleus (Roe v. Wade and Endangered Species Act both passed in 1973, Murder Babies/save trees, birds, insects)
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To: Chode
Thanks for the link. Lot of history I didn't know. Only thing the EDO's of the 1970's the officers under Chief Engineer or CHENG were usually smart. We had a Main Propulsion Assistant a Lt Commander who knew every valve number on the carrier and where they were actually located as above a pipe being a hatch etc. The man you wanted around when things started going wrong. You could take him at his word that he was correct.

I read it laughing out loud. I remember getting into a heated debate over an unlawfull order one night with the ships 1st LT rank of LTCDR or the Deck Department Oficer. I won it too LOL.

38 posted on 02/26/2007 6:46:51 PM PST by cva66snipe (Kool Aid! The popular American favorite drink now Made In Mexico. Pro-Open Borders? Drink Up!)
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To: cva66snipe
Image hosted by Photobucket.com BravoZulu...
39 posted on 02/26/2007 6:58:07 PM PST by Chode (American Hedonist ©®)
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To: wagglebee
What they want to is create future Terri Schiavos - under full color of law.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

40 posted on 02/26/2007 9:45:31 PM PST by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives In My Heart Forever)
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