Free Republic

He says he wants to live. But his wife, caregivers and South Carolina state officials are so focused on carrying out a decade-old, out-of-state living will that 79-year-old Jimmy Chambers can't get a word in edgewise. That's the account of 10 of Chambers's children and their spouses who signed sworn affidavits in an attempt to block their mother from removing his life-sustaining ventilator, which would cause his death. It's a case that's reminiscent of the Terri Schiavo controversy which captured the attention of millions around the world, in which a fault line opened up in the middle of a formerly...

Burke Balch, director of the Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics of the National Right to Life Committee, says the Netherlands is no longer sliding down a slippery slope, but rather has fallen off a moral cliff as the medical community in that nation expands its euthanasia practices. He notes that the Dutch government intends to expand its euthanasia guidelines to include so-called "mercy killing" of children with spina bifida or other disabilities, as long as the parents consent. This development is horrifying, though not surprising, Balch contends, because once a price is placed on human life, the price goes...

Eight million at the voting booths, sixteen million at Mass. The sixteen million were boycotting the referendum... And by doing this, they were upholding a law which places some moral restrictions on IVF...[It]forbids the production of an excessive number of embryos, embryonic selection, their use and elimination, and recourse to fertilization outside of the couple. This grassroots mobilization of the Catholic world received little national media coverage, but it was responsible in great part for the result of the June 12-13 referendum. For example, Radio Maria, which is directed by Fr. Lino Fanzaga and counts six million faithful listeners, began...

BRITAIN’S top medical ethics expert has urged doctors to let the most premature babies die, with treatment offered only in exceptional cases. Baroness Warnock believes Britain should follow Holland in setting an age limit below which babies would not routinely be resuscitated. She says this would prevent doctors competing for the “triumph” of keeping babies alive at increasingly young ages even though they may not survive in the long term or may be left severely disabled. Warnock’s comments were backed in part by Britain’s most senior paediatrician, who said the setting of a lower limit should be considered. In Holland,...

Parents undergoing fertility treatment should be allowed to choose the sex of their baby for "family balancing", says a radical report by the UK parliament's committee on science and technology. The controversial document makes many other bold suggestions on human reproductive technologies. It does not rule out human reproductive cloning in the future; it backs the use of human-animal hybrid embryos for research; and it challenges the UK government's intention to strip the anonymity from future sperm and egg donors. "It's a very liberal and far-thinking report - that is what has caused the controversy," says Peter Braude, chairman of...

SPRINGFIELD -- On Thursday of this week, legislation determining whether a baby born alive is to be defined as “a person” in Illinois will face its first hurdle in the state’s General Assembly. It is likely to be heard in the House Judiciary I Committee, now chaired by Chicago Democrat Rep. John Fritchey. Similar proposals have been stopped four times in the past five years, but supporters say that because the language is simplified, the odds have increased that it may be finally successful in getting through the Illinois House committee. This movement is despite resistance by Planned Parenthood and...

AFTER THE SUICIDE of his terminally ill mother, Oakland advertising executive Kevin Smith welcomed — with great relief — his cancer-stricken father's plan for doctor-assisted death. Smith and others like him say there are powerful arguments for California to follow Oregon in adopting physician-aided suicide. The move, proposed by two legislators representing parts of the Bay Area and Los Angeles, has been criticized by individuals as a bad idea and rejected twice in California. But it has faced no formal, organized opposition so far this time. Legislation introduced this week by Democratic Assembly members Patty Berg of Eureka and Lloyd...

Do people really want doctors to help them end their lives in times of pain and illness? To listen to the media or read the press, you certainly would think so. Advocates of euthanasia argue that if people are given a choice between dying in agonizing pain or undergoing euthanasia/physician assisted suicide (PAS), the preferred choice would be euthanasia/PAS. Indeed, few people would choose to die in agony, except possibly Jesus, as the recent movie The Passion of the Christ has so graphically re-enacted. However, the presentation of only these two extreme alternatives is deeply biased. Agonizing pain and euthanasia/PAS...

The following photographs were taken by Floriduh Voter on December 12, 2004. On that Sunday afternoon, family, friends, supporters and advocates of Terri Schindler-Schiavo gathered to honor her day of birth and celebrate her life. The following thumbnails will 'pop' into a new browser window. We extend our thanks to everyone who attended, to those who sent greetings and prayers and to everyone who has befriended this family in their struggle to protect their daughter's life and liberty.  Terri  41st Birthday Celebration of Life Sunday, December 12, 2004 Guest of Honor, Terri Schindler-Schiavo, was not in attendance at the...

Cosmetic surgery was born 2,500 years ago and came of age in the inferno of the Western Front. The controversy about it is still growing. by Ellen Feldman In A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway’s celebration of the long cocktail party that was Paris in the twenties, he pays tribute to the war veterans who frequented the Café Lilas and describes “the quality of their artificial eyes and the degree of skill with which their faces had been reconstructed. There was always an almost iridescent shiny cast about the considerably reconstructed face, rather like that of a well packed ski run,...

A woman television presenter who was critically injured in the Potters Bar train crash has made a miraculous recovery - nearly two years after doctors declared her brain-dead and said that she should be allowed to die. Relatives of Tanya Liu, a 34-year-old Taiwanese-born newsreader, say they were told by British doctors that she was in a persistent vegetative state after the crash in May 2002, which killed two of her friends and five other people, and left 76 injured. Doctors at the Royal Free Hospital in north London said that Ms Liu's injuries were so horrific that there was...

March 20, 2004, 11:34 AM EST VATICAN CITY -- Pope John Paul II said Saturday the removal of feeding tubes from people in vegetative states was immoral, and that no judgment on their quality of life could justify such "euthanasia by omission." John Paul made the comments to participants of a Vatican conference on the ethical dilemmas of dealing with incapacitated patients, entering into a debate that has sparked court battles in the United States and elsewhere. The pope said even the medical terminology used to describe people in so-called "persistent vegetative states" was degrading to them. He said no...

Two cases of European doctors refusing to treat their patients are cause for concern: Futile Care Theory may be coming to America. A LITTLE NOTICED LITIGATION in the United Kingdom could be a harbinger of medical woes to come here in the United States. Leslie Burke, age 44, is suing for the right to stay alive. Yes, you read right: Burke, who has a terminal neurological disease, is deathly afraid that doctors will refuse to provide him wanted food and water when his condition deteriorates to the point that has to receive nourishment through a feeding tube. Burke' fears are,...

March 12, 2004 Today, Judge Douglas Baird denied the parents of Terri Schindler-Schiavo (Bob and Mary Schindler) intervention and participation in the constitutionality case of Terri's Law for the second time. Judge Baird had previously denied Terri's parents participation in November, 2003. Upon review of the courts previous order, the Second District Court of Appeals determined that: "In denying the Schindlers' motion to intervene, the trial court did not address either of the elements of the Morgareidge intervention rule. Although the order denying the Schindlers' subsequent motion for rehearing does use language that appears to acknowledge the Morgareidge rule by...

A LITTLE NOTICED LITIGATION in the United Kingdom could be a harbinger of medical woes to come here in the United States. Leslie Burke, age 44, is suing for the right to stay alive. Yes, you read right: Burke, who has a terminal neurological disease, is deathly afraid that doctors will refuse to provide him wanted food and water when his condition deteriorates to the point that has to receive nourishment through a feeding tube.

Clearwater, FL (LifeNews.com) -- The family of Terri Schiavo, on Tuesday, filed a contempt of court motion against Terri's estranged husband Michael. They say he is once again withholding information from them concerning Terri's medical condition, in violation of a 1996 court order. Last week, Terri began vomiting and Terri's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, asked nursing and hospice staff what had caused it and what measures were being taken to treat Terri. Terri is currently living at Park Place Assisted Living Facility in Clearwater, Florida, and staff at the facility told the Schindlers that they were under orders from...

TAMPA, Fla. -- "Terri's Law" was actually an appropriate label for the measure passed by the Florida Legislature last fall to save the life of brain-damaged woman Terri Schiavo. Lawmakers in special session crafted the bill so narrowly as to apply only to Schiavo's unique situation. At the urging of her parents, they gave Gov. Jeb Bush authority to order a feeding tube reinserted into her stomach, six days after her husband had it removed with court permission. The unprecedented government intervention into a right-to-die case attracted national attention, aroused strong emotions on both sides and brought to the forefront...

Lawmakers Tackle Right-to-Die Debate ATLANTA (AP) -- The case of a brain-damaged Florida woman who has been the focus of a fight over whether she should die has inspired a bill in the Georgia Legislature. Terry Schiavo of Clearwater, Fla., had been kept alive artificially since 1990, and her husband said she would've wanted to be allowed to die. The tube was removed for six days in October, but then the Florida Legislature and the governor stepped in to have the tube reinserted and an independent guardian appointed for her. Schiavo is still alive. The case inspired a Georgia representative,...

The American Medical Association is debating physician-assisted suicide. Some believe the group will back the controversial practice. The American Medical Association (AMA) is set to vote on a controversial measure that, if approved, would essentially endorse the practice of physician-assisted suicide. First, some background: Two years ago, Attorney General John Ashcroft ruled that drugs controlled by the federal government could not be used to assist a suicide. The issue has been tied up in the courts since, but at the time, the AMA backed Ashcroft. This resolution would withdraw the AMA's support and instead endorse physician-assisted suicide, which troubles Burke...

DEAR DR. GOTT: How do you doctors get rid of a patient if you no longer want to see him or her?DEAR READER: This is a fascinating topic that I will address in a rather long-winded, but (I hope) interesting way. All doctors have a few truly obnoxious patients. No matter what the physician does or what methods he employs, his efforts are met with skepticism, mockery and -- sometimes -- angry confrontation. I'm sure this is as true in primitive cultures as it is in the so-called developed world. However, practitioners in different societies have diverse ways of handling...