8mm
Posted on 04/10/2007 4:20:29 PM PDT by wagglebee
My Fox Austin carried an interesting and informative article "Family Still Fighting to Keep Terminally-Ill Toddler Alive" by Kelley Shannon, Associated Press Writer (April 9, 2007). An article that reminds us that Tuesday, April 10th, at 5 P.M. Emilio's fate once again rests in the hands of Children's Hospital of Austin, unless a judge intercedes or a miracle takes place. Maybe the governor will demand a stay of execution? Or perhaps the hospital will voluntarily agree to extend the deadline even further? If not... the toddler will be executed in a matter of hours.
There is a reason why this is an execution, rather than making a respected medical decision for a patient.
For a family to decide all is hopeless for a terminally ill patient and request that doctors don't merely keep the patient alive because they can, is one thing. For doctors, a hospital and so-called ethics committee to over-rule a family's wishes and give a mere ten-day notice as though dealing with the shut off of a utility, rather than the termination of life of a human being, is beyond wrong. Convicted murderers enjoy more due process than the innocent who happen to be ill. There is something quite wrong with this fact.
There are those who scream foul and insist that the government had no business getting involved in the Terri Schiavo case, while then suggesting that it is acceptable for the government to make a law that hands over rights of life and death to hospitals, doctors and so-called ethics committees, who could have an agenda that is in direct conflict with the well-being of a patient or patients falling within specific groups. Their argument, on the one hand, is that these cases are "private family matters", but on the other, that some families are incapable of making intelligent and rightful decisions and so must have these decisions FORCED upon them by the system. So these matters are only "private family matters" when deciding to "let someone go", but "public matters" should the family wish to fight for a loved one that the system thinks ought to be let go? How interesting!
Terri Schiavo was not terminally ill. It was not a matter of removing the life support that was "all" that was keeping her alive. She was not dying, until a court "actually" ordered her to be starved and dehydrated to death. An order that would kill off the healthiest among us, if imposed upon him or her. An order that should have been challenged -- and still should be -- if any of us are to be safe.
Emilio, like Terri, is vulnerable and at the mercy of a system that may no longer have much mercy to offer.
How can any suggest that what is happening to Emilio is painful, while then arguing that, " Emilio's higher order brain functions are destroyed"? Wouldn't that then mean that he no longer feels pain in a way that will register, or register in any meaningful way, and therefore, prolonging his life and "invasive" has no true meaning to him? Why then use that as cause to end the baby's life? Might it be a form of damage control?
Emilio Gonzales is a very sick little boy. No one denies or challenges that fact. What must be challenged is the doctor, hospital and so-called ethics committee's right to over-rule a family and invoke a ten day notice to terminate life. A right that may apply to little Emilio today, but who shall be affected tomorrow? And have we forgotten Andrea Clark -- a person that was conscious and wished to fight for life? This law is a right to execute those that are believed to have no quality of life according to the standards of those invoking the futile care law and those such as it. Executing those who are considered to have nothing to give back to society and are considered merely a drain on our resources.
Emilio Gonzales may only have a few hours left, unless a judge intercedes or a miracle takes place. That is known. But there is another question to be considered. How long does our society (once made up of compassionate human beings) have before the transformation into cold and calculating robots, that can no longer appreciate the beauty and miracle of life, become complete? Cold and calculating robots that can so easily snuff life. Snuff it with a ten day termination notice with no chance of reconnection.
Execution or miracle? I'm hoping for a miracle!
evil and cruel and diablical are words to describe the treatments and procedures and indignities this little baby has undergone in the name of "saving" him when saving him was never an option......
I would like us to go back about 100 yrs.....we let people die a natural death, saying it was "God's will"....and let it go at that....
I remember clearly my mother praying to God to take my grandmother to heaven.....my Mom hated seeing my cancer ridden grandmother in pain .......
I've always admired her for that.....
It’s disingenuous to suggest that public policy doesn’t affect individuals, especially when that policy is directly aimed at individuals. Putting forth an unfair argument has nothing to do with whether or not life in general is fair. We all know life is sometimes unfair, but that’s another matter. Still, I’ll try to avoid that word in my posts to you, as I understand it has a certain unpleasant connotation for you.
There is more to consider than just what policy will benefit the most people. Slavery benefited the majority, at great cost to the few. Exterminating the biggest financial drains would improve our economy, but at an unacceptable cost to the few.
There is no difference between the medical condition of a child whose parents take him home, and the medical condition of a child whose parents leave him in the hospital. Yet you make the distinction that if the parents care for him themselves at their own expense, he’s alive, but if they leave him in the hospital at public expense, he’s a dead body with no soul. The name on the bill has nothing to do with whether he’s dead or alive, and it has nothing to do with whether or not it would be wrong to kill him. If it’s wrong to kill a child whose parents are wealthy, it’s wrong to kill the same child just because his parents are penniless.
I’ve seen two arguments on this thread in support of killing Emilio. My post #9, and DakotaRed’s post #88. Everyone seems to think their insights are unique, but they all echo one or both of those posts.
~snip~
As a mother whose child has been on life support since she was 18-months-old, (she's now 20,) I'm appalled that the Austin, Texas hospital's ethics committees are violating a families rights -- planning to take 17-month-old Emilio Gonzales off life support despite his family's decision to keep him alive.
My daughter, who is still on life support, leads a very happy and healthy life. The Texas hospital we were in - in the eighties, would have gladly ended Laura's life if they'd had the power to do so, when Laura was originally hurt in a violent car crash. We, her family said "No!" to their efforts to pull her plug.
Thank God the ethics committee had no power. Laura has grown up to be a happy, young adult; though disabled.
But times have changed -- prejudice against the disabled is growing. Today, my family is afraid Laura will be denied emergency care at some of our local hospitals. In fact, we've already had to come against ER doctors who've tried to do just that, deny care, simply because they didn't understand the value of my daughter's life. I stood up to them and my daughter received the help she needed. The doctor who had tried to deny antibiotics, later apologized when he saw her amazing joy and personality -- as she was recovering from a simple but severe bladder infection. With tears in his eyes, this same doctor said, "I'm sorry, I didn't know."
But my question is, where will this lack of respect for the lives of the disabled stop?
~snip~
J—There’s a radical difference between exterminating the mentally retarded, as the Nazis did, and withholding expensive, superfluous medical treatment with no reasonable hope of accomplishing anything other than keeping a vegetable alive indefinitely.
There is a quantifiable difference between a mentally retarded individual and a vegetable
Irish....According to the social Darwinian “survival of the fittest” view, man has no soul, spirit, mind, reason, self, or memory (among other things.) Why? Because these positive goods exist within the metaphysical (aka supernatural) realm, and since the supernatural cannot be sensed, i.e. seen, tested, etc., they therefore do not exist. According to EO Wilson, when man believes he has ‘sensed’ the self, he has merely experienced an epiphenomenon (illusion).
So what is man sans his ‘metaphysical” aspects? A bundle of nerves...a collection of atomistic electrons...a slightly smarter chimp. In the words of Hitler...useless eaters. In the words of Mao and Lenin...lice. In the words of social Darwinian American abortionists....vaginal material, parasites, collection of cells. In the words of social Darwinian American bio-ethicists....vegetables (when the bundle of nerves falls into a coma, etc).
It's about money to most of them, though they don't want to admit it. Sure, the cost to care for this little boy is a lot. However, once society concedes that there is a monetary threshold for keeping people alive, that figure will begin to steadily drop. Once someone agrees to put a price on human life, life itself loses value.
Ok, you may not share my view on the sanctity of life. Surely, as a conservative, you are outraged that a medical bureaucracy is making life and death decisions for a family?
That alone is unacceptable.
I just don't that extraordinary measures need to be taken.
This situation is extremely sad, but hospitals aren't long-term care facilities. The family had time to find care for this child but couldn't. There are religious institutions out there who value life who might have taken this baby if the condition wasn't so futile.
So...
Despite the blah-blah over viability. The question I pose to you: whose decision should this be?
On the other hand, can parents hold a hospital hostage indefinitely and force it to provide extraordinary means of care? I don't think so.
Extraordinary end of life care is responsible for a huge percentage of our medical costs? As a christian, I don't believe extraordinary care is mandated, nor do I believe the child is better off here instead of with God.
It’s true that some lines have to be drawn somewhere.
But the idea of a doctor saying who lives and who dies is wrong. And God said “Thou shalt not kill”. Look it up; it’s in Genesis somewhere. :->
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