Posted on 11/30/2004 11:17:14 AM PST by Pyro7480
Netherlands Hospital Euthanizes Babies
By TOBY STERLING, Associated Press Writer
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - Raising the stakes in an excruciating ethical debate, a hospital in the Netherlands — the first nation to permit euthanasia — recently proposed guidelines for mercy killings of terminally ill newborns, and then made a startling revelation: It has already begun carrying out such procedures in a handful of cases and reporting them to the government.
The announcement last month by the Groningen Academic Hospital came amid a growing discussion in Holland on whether to legalize euthanasia on people incapable of deciding for themselves whether they want to end their lives — a prospect viewed with horror by euthanasia opponents and as a natural evolution by advocates.
In August, the main Dutch doctors' association KNMG urged the Health Ministry to create an independent board to review euthanasia cases for terminally ill people "with no free will," including children, the severely mentally retarded, and people left in an irreversible coma after an accident.
The Health Ministry is preparing its response to the request, a spokesman said, and it may come as soon as December.
Three years ago, the Dutch parliament made it legal for doctors to inject a sedative and a lethal dose of muscle relaxant at the request of adult patients suffering great pain with no hope of relief.
The Groningen Protocol, as the hospital's guidelines have come to be known, would create a legal framework for permitting doctors to actively end the life of newborns deemed to be in similar pain from incurable disease or extreme deformities.
The guideline says euthanasia is acceptable when the child's medical team and independent doctors agree the pain cannot be eased and there is no prospect for improvement, and when parents think it's best.
Examples include extremely premature births, where children suffer brain damage from bleeding and convulsions; and diseases where a child could only survive on life support for the rest of its life such as spina bifida and epidermosis bullosa, a blistering illness.
The hospital said it carried out four such mercy killings in 2003, and reported all cases to government prosecutors — but there have been no legal proceedings taken against them.
Catholic organizations and the Vatican have reacted with outrage to Groningen's announcement, and U.S. euthanasia opponents contend that the proposal shows the Dutch have lost their moral compass.
"The slippery slope in the Netherlands has descended already into a vertical cliff," said Wesley J. Smith, a prominent California-based critic, in an e-mail to The Associated Press.
Child euthanasia remains illegal everywhere. Experts say doctors outside of Holland do not report cases for fear of prosecution.
"As things are, people are doing this secretly and that's wrong," said Eduard Verhagen, head of Groningen's children's' clinic. "In the Netherlands we want to expose everything, to let everything be subjected to vetting."
According to the Justice Ministry, four cases of child euthanasia were reported to prosecutors in 2003. Two were reported in 2002, seven in 2001 and five in 2000. All the cases in 2003 were reported by Groningen, but some of the cases in other years were from other hospitals.
Groningen estimated the protocol would be applicable in about 10 cases per year in the Netherlands, a country with 16 million people.
Since the introduction of the Dutch law, Belgium has also legalized euthanasia, while in France, legislation to allow doctor-assisted suicide is currently under debate. In the United States, the state of Oregon is alone in allowing physician-assisted suicide, but this is under constant legal challenge.
However, experts acknowledge that doctors euthanize routinely in the United States but that such practice is hidden.
"Measures that might marginally extend a child's life by minutes or hours or days or weeks are stopped. This happens routinely, namely, every day," said Lance Stell, professor of medical ethics at Davidson College and staff ethicist at Carolinas Medical Center in the United States. "Everybody knows that it happens, but there's a lot of hypocrisy. Instead, people talk about things they're not going to do."
More than half of all deaths occur under medical supervision, so it's really about management and method of death, Stell said.
Cordially,
See #48...
Economics should never trump morality. When it does... Europe is the result.
Those who vote with their wallets elect their fate.
Well, when it was devised, wasn't 65 near the end of the life span? So, without changing the law, the whole purpose of the program has changed - people collect for a much longer time than originally anticipated.
But we have to find a better solution than "getting rid" of people.
In other words, useless eaters?
Cordially,
"It wasn't invective. It was truth."
Ok, but it wasn't an answer to the question I posed, which was "What is the alternative - to live off the nanny state and tax dollars or force the parents to go broke quickly in order to pay for vegetative health care?"
I'm personally NOT in favor of the gov't paying for the health care, nor am I in favor of makign a family go broke by forcing them to pay for medical care. Are you aware how expensive such treatments and care for severely-handicapped/life-support patients is?
BTW, I'm well aware of Nazi Germany and its atrocities.
As far as I know, I haven't walked in anyone's shoes but my own. Does that make it impossible for me to decide right from wrong?
God, your post sounds so... relativist.
People use the same arguments for abortion. "Oh, I can't afford to have a baby at this point, etc." These arguments are based in a very materialistic/social Darwinist mentality. Oh, btw, I know how much such health care costs, but somehow, some people are able to pull it off, because they think (correctly) that life is worth more than any amount of money.
"Economics should never trump morality."
So, you are in favor of either increasing the size of gov't to pay the skyrocketing costs of dealing with severely-handicapped people and those who are vegetative/on life support, or you are in favor of forcing individuals to go broke paying for such treatment themselves. I mean, there are only two options here, if the people are to be cared for.
Then again, we could keep them alive and hope that someday, genetic or stem-cell research could provide a cure...but I'm guessing that many of the conservatives in this thread are probably against both of those too...
When I read about things like this going on in Holland, I start to wonder if I'm "connecting the dots" correctly.
Their society has condoned euthinasia, abortion, free love, drugs, and an overall "open" and permissive society. They've completely rejected the Christian basis at the root of their original culture.
On the one hand many in Holland are now starting to realize the dangers of having openned themselves to militant islamo-facists. But I think for Holland, it's too late - I'm starting to think that for the Netherlands, islamic domination IS their punishment.
I am proud. She's a nonstop talker and reader, just like her mom, so it's not really a surprise, but yeah, I'm just about to float away (the ticket came in Monday.)
"People use the same arguments for abortion."
Well, I'm not. The topic involves severely-handicapped children who need lifelong care just to eat, or are on life-support. They've already been born, so your attempt at using another hot-topic (abortion) fails. Hell, there are many 'conservatives' who get abortions over the sex of the child! Abortion is not the topic here.
"some people are able to pull it off, because they think (correctly) that life is worth more than any amount of money."
Some people != All of the people. What are the ones who can't "pull it off" supposed to do, besides live off the gov't? If you don't have an answer to that, then you support increasing the Nanny State and its influence and thus, aren't much of a conservative. We're supposed to be about "less gov't", not more. Or have you forgotten Ronald Reagan?
But don't try saying anything bad about Bush if you just signed up, you will be "zotted".
It always does when it's your wallet.
A friend of mine was 17 1/2 weeks pregnant with her first child when her water broke. She was rushed to the hospital, where they said there was an 80% chance she would go into labor in the next seven days. So they prayed.
In eight days, when she showed no signs of labor, but still with very little amniotic fluid, the doctors told her that she could abort (although her doctors refused to perform abortions, but would understand if that was her wish and would refer her to a "termination specialist"). The chance of the baby surviving outside the womb was about 1%, and only that high because they never say zero. Being a Christian, she refused, and went home to lay on complete bed rest.
Six weeks later (still no labor, still very little amniotic fluid, but the baby's heartbeat was still strong), her doctor sent her to a specialist in prenatal care, since the baby was now considered "viable."
This specialist was a woman doctor, visibly pregnant(guessing at about six months). She laid out for my friend and her husband that there really was a 99.9% chance the baby would not survive, because without fluid, the lungs were not developing at all. The option was for my friend to check into the hospital now and wait there until she went into labor (and spend Thanksgiving there), or to wait it out at home, and hope to make it to the hospital in time. So my friend, noticing the doctor's rounded belly, asked softly, "Doctor, if you were in my shoes, what would you do?"
The doctor's face turned red, and she got visibly angry. "Well, I can't believe your doctors let this pregnancy continue," she spurted. "I would have demanded you terminate. But it's too late now. Too late, so I just don't even know what to tell you to do. Discuss it with your husband, and I'll be back in a moment."
Unbelievably, my friend found out from her doctor that THE SPECIALIST CALLED HER DOCTOR TO COMPLAIN!! She actually yelled on the phone to my friend's obstetrician that they had no business giving my friend any other option but to terminate.
This is where American obstetricians are today, folks. We are ON the slippery slope.
Anyway, the baby was stillborn, but my friend has never questioned her decision to allow GOD to decide the fate of her little boy, and he is now an angel in heaven.
You say that like it's a bad thing!
It is. You one of 'em?
You seem to miss the irony that we've aborted 40 million future "economic producers"/taxpayers from society because they present economic hardships...
Genetic and stem cell research is great. I'm all in favor of it. Embryonic stem cell research is an abject failure that treats human beings as tinker toys that can be stored away/used/manipulated/destroyed for the sake of - get this - humanity.
It's not about "forgetting Reagan," who actually, didn't do quite a good job at rolling back government, other than lowering taxes. It's about valuing life at all its stages.
Tell that to Martha Stewart.
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