Free Republic

The House health-care reform bill proposes to decrease hospital visits by establishing a “medical home pilot program” for elderly and disabled Americans. Such a medical home would not require a physician to be on the staff, and therefore could be run solely by nurse practitioners and physician assistants. Medical homes also would practice “evidence-based” medicine, which advocates only the use of medical treatments that are supported by effectiveness research. But physicians’ groups say the legislation could lead to restrictions on which treatments may be used for certain conditions, despite the fact that some patients might require a unique or unconventional...

You have advanced kidney cancer. It will kill you, probably in the next year or two. A drug called Sutent slows the spread of the cancer and may give you an extra six months, but at a cost of $54,000. Is a few more months worth that much? If you can afford it, you probably would pay that much, or more, to live longer, even if your quality of life wasn’t going to be good. But suppose it’s not you with the cancer but a stranger covered by your health-insurance fund. If the insurer provides this man — and everyone...

You have advanced kidney cancer. It will kill you, probably in the next year or two. A drug called Sutent slows the spread of the cancer and may give you an extra six months, but at a cost of $54,000. Is a few more months worth that much? If you can afford it, you probably would pay that much, or more, to live longer, even if your quality of life wasn’t going to be good. But suppose it’s not you with the cancer but a stranger covered by your health-insurance fund. If the insurer provides this man — and everyone...

Tuesday June 23, 2009 Obama Abruptly Sacks Bio-ethics Panel Critical of Embryonic Stem-Cell Research By Peter J. SmithWASHINGTON, D.C., June 23, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The White House has dismissed the members of the President’s US Council on Bioethics just a few months before their mandate expires, indicating their services are no longer required by the President and that he is looking for a more “practical� advisory board. The New York Times reported that Reid Cherlin, a White House press officer, told the paper that President Barack Obama saw them as "a philosophically leaning advisory group" designed by the previous...

The 65-31 vote came after Democrats urged quick action so that Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius could get to work leading the federal response to the flu outbreak.

Appearing before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was confronted in a way she probably wasn't expecting. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., asked the secretary to account for her comments the previous month, when she accepted the Margaret Sanger Award from the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. "I admire Margaret Sanger enormously," Clinton had said in March, "her courage, her tenacity, her vision ... And when I think about what she did all those years ago in Brooklyn, taking on archetypes, taking on attitudes and accusations flowing from all directions, I am really in awe of...

When someone with a terminal illness decides to end their life by overdosing on barbiturates, they hope the drugs will lull them into a peaceful and permanent sleep. But if the drugs have passed their expiration date or lack a sufficiently lethal concentration, the would-be suicide victim may actually survive - risking an array of complications including coma, reduced physical functioning and the opprobrium of disapproving friends and family. Now, in an effort to provide certainty to those contemplating suicide, one of the world's leading euthanasia advocates plans to sell barbiturate testing kits to confirm that deadly drug cocktails are,...

Health Service paramedics have been told not to resuscitate terminally-ill patients who register on a controversial new database to say they want to die. It has been set up by the ambulance service in London for hundreds of people who have only a few months to live so that they may register their 'death wishes' in advance. It is believed to be the first in the country, but other trusts around the country are expected to follow suit to comply with Government guidelines which state that patients' wishes should be taken into account, even at the point of death. Patients'...

WASHINGTON, April 3, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a speech to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America Awards Gala, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that she admires "Margaret Sanger enormously, her courage, her tenacity, her vision." Secretary Clinton said she is "really in awe of" Sanger for Sanger's early work in Brooklyn, New York, "taking on archetypes, taking on attitudes and accusations flowing from all directions." Immediately following a trip to Mexico's Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the patroness of the pro-life movement, Mrs. Clinton travelled to Texas on March 28, where she was awarded the Margaret...

Salem, OR (LifeNews.com) -- The number of assisted suicides in Oregon has increased 30 percent in the last two years and euthanasia activists themselves may have provided the reasons why. It appears members of Compassion & Choices have infiltrated the hospice system and are urging patients to kill themselves.LifeNews.com reported on the increase earlier this month, but a Compassion & Choice press release last week provided an interesting take on the report.The group said that "nearly 100% of terminally ill individuals using the law in 2008 were enrolled in hospice.""Hospice enrollment among those using the Act increased to 98%,...

AMA Supports President's Decision to Fund Stem Cell Research For immediate release March 9, 2009 Statement attributable to: Joseph Heyman, MD Board Chair, American Medical Association "The American Medical Association supports President Obama's decision to lift the ban on federal funding of stem cell research. Stem cell research holds great promise to treat diseases that science has so far been unable to cure, and this change in policy will allow researchers to accelerate their efforts by applying for federal research funds. "The AMA supports biomedical research on stem cells and has encouraged strong public support of federal funding for this...

LONDON, March 12, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - An Oxford University stem cell expert has urged the use of aborted children in organ transplants as a solution to the shortage of available organs. Sir Richard Gardner has called for a feasibility study on the possibility of obtaining organs from the bodies of aborted babies.He said, "It is probably a more realistic technique in dealing with the shortage of kidney donors than others."The Daily Mail reports that pro-life and Christian groups have called the proposal "morally abhorrent," and said it will result in abortions being timed to suit transplant patients. Dr Peter...