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It was for a second opinion that pregnant Niketa and husband Haresh Mehta landed up at gynaecologist Nikhil Datar's clinic in suburban Mumbai last month. They didn't want to continue with the pregnancy after discovering that the foetus had a heart problem, but Indian laws don't allow abortion beyond 20 weeks. Their gynaecologist felt that Dr Datar, who also has a degree in law, would be able to guide them better. What followed had the nation transfixed for over a week.
Medical dilemmas have a way of gripping attention. The entire world watched for five days as 41-year-old Terri Schiavo lay dying after the US courts permitted her husband to perform euthanasia using starvation and dehydration. The plight of Baby Manjhi, the daughter of a Japanese couple born to an Indian surrogate mother, is also being observed across the globe.
It is not just the smell of antiseptic that is common to all medical corridors. Dilemmas over medical ethics, too, are all familiar here. Ask Dr Samiran Nundy, Delhi-based transplant surgeon who drafted India's first law on transplant of organs in the early nineties, and he recalls how during his days in the AIIMS there always was a shortage of respirators as compared to the number of patients needing the contraption. "How can you decide which patient needs the respirator more than the other? It is such a dilemma," he says..............
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I think the stories of patients being refused life-extending chemotherapy by Oregon's Medicaid--but offered assisted suicide instead--will materially impact the I-1000 legalization effort in Washington. First, this kind of heartlessness was predicted by opponents. Second, the old myth that Oregon has operated without abuses is now shattered. Third, unlike other Oregon abuses, the MSM is actually reporting the story--like an extended report on ABC News. From the story:The health plan takes "no position" on the physician-assisted suicide law, according to spokesman Jim Sellers. The terminally ill who qualify can receive pain medication, comfort and hospice care, "no matter what the cost," he said. But Sellers acknowledged the letter to Wagner was a public relations blunder and something the state is "working on."
"Now we have to review to ensure sensitivity and clarity," Sellers told ABCNews.com "Not only is the patient receiving had news, but insensitivity on top of that. This is something that requires the human touch."...................
Wesley J. Smith: MSM Finally Discovers Compassionlessness of Oregon Assisted Suicide
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