[nuffsenuff]

Does anyone ever stop and ask these "experts" if they are pro-choice?

Because I'd bet most of them are. And therefore, their motives are suspect.

[whershey]

http://www.health24.com/news/Ageing/1-888,24630.asp

...

Miraculous recoveries considered In six cases, patients who were disconnected from life support ended up surviving and leaving the intensive care unit.

Those miraculous recoveries don't undermine the general policy of taking patients off life support when further treatment is futile, says Dr Lawrence Schneiderman, an expert in medical ethics at the University of California, USA. We can sometimes be wrong; sometimes the unexpected happens. Trying to avoid the rare error by keeping everyone on ventilators would subject the vast majority to unnecessary, and perhaps cruel, procedures, he says.

Many ethical dilemmas However, the intensive care unit is thick with ethical dilemmas. Doctors believe they know what patients want in terms of life support, and that family members can fill in blanks. But Schneiderman says his own research suggests that what physicians think critically ill people want is in fact nearer to what they would choose for themselves. Family members, too, aren't especially reliable translators of their loved one's wishes.

We're always relying on surrogate decision makers or physicians, Schneiderman says. But there's plenty of evidence that it doesn't correlate too well with what patients truly desire. - (HealthDayNews)

I wonder if the good doctor asked those patients who recovered what they think of his feelings on the subject.