In Canada, the Schiavo Case with an Outrageous Twist
Saturday, February 16th, 2008Dear HumanDHS Friends!
Comment by Brian Lynch:
Please note:
First let me say that I find this appalling and outside the bounds of what any self respecting “ethicists”might be involved in. The world is indeed dangerous form all angles. In other places I have written at length about the Schiavo case.
I would first say that it is unfortunate to even bring up that name. The press again muddles the waters by comparing the two cases . Each case is different with common elements. The common elements are what “Medical Ethics” have tried to and pretty much succeeded in parsing out over nearly forty years. Here none of that is being paid attention to.
This seems to be pure autocracy. It is also unfortunately the logical conclusion for some of the thinking of some people like Leon Kass who is a self respecting “ethicist” who has long supported a “duty to die” or at least suggested it.
Please see “comments if interested in the rest of these remarks and their relevance to “humiliation” Thank you.
Start of the article:In Canada, the Schiavo case with an outrageous twist
By Jonathan Rosenblum
An elderly Orthodox Jew is on life support. His children have adamantly opposed his removal from the ventilator and feeding tube, on the grounds that Jewish law expressly forbids any action designed to shorten life. If their father could express his wishes, they say, he would certainly oppose the doctors acting to deliberately terminate his life. The director of the ICU told the children that neither their father’s wishes nor their own are relevant, and he would do whatever he decided was appropriate
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | A Winnipeg case currently winding its way to its grim conclusion pits the children of Samuel Golubchuk against doctors at the Salvation Army Grace General Hospital. According to the pleadings, Golubchuk’s doctors informed his children that their 84-year-old father is “in the process of dying” and that they intended to hasten the process by removing his ventilation, and if that proved insufficient to kill him quickly, to also remove his feeding tube. In the event that the patient showed discomfort during these procedures, the chief of the hospital’s ICU unit stated in his affidavit that he would administer morphine.
Golubchuk is an Orthodox Jew, as are his children. The latter have adamantly opposed his removal from the ventilator and feeding tube, on the grounds that Jewish law expressly forbids any action designed to shorten life, and that if their father could express his wishes, he would oppose the doctors acting to deliberately terminate his life.
In response, the director of the ICU informed Golubchuk’s children that neither their father’s wishes nor their own are relevant, and he would do whatever he decided was appropriate. Bill Olson, counsel for the ICU director, told the Canadian Broadcasting Company that physicians have the sole right to make decisions about treatment — even if it goes against a patient’s religious beliefs — and that “there is no right to a continuation of treatment.”
That position was supported by Dr. Jeff Blackner, executive director of the office of ethics of the Canadian Medical Association. He told Reuters: “[W]e want to make sure that clinical decisions are left to physicians and not judges.” Doctors’ decisions are made only with the “best interest of the individual patient at heart,” he said, though he did not explain how that could be squared with the undisputed claim that this patient would oppose the doctors’ decision. Meanwhile, an Angus Reid poll of Canadians showed that 68% supported leaving the final decision with the family.