|  Re: Terri Schiavo's case -
24th March 2005
Keep politics out of this?! It is politics that caused the mess in Terri's case to begin with! With all his talk about preservation of life, it is amusing (no, sad actually) that Dubya seemed to forget he allowed a law in Texas to remove the feeding tube of a patient in a vegetative state against the wishes of the parents (I believe this is when they can't afford to pay for the medical care or something of the sort). What a hypocrite! The point is, this entire thing has turned into a media circus and little attention is paying paid to what THE LAW actually says. It's really unfortunate but you can't apply the law in some cases and in other cases ignore it. And now Congress is encroaching on the justice system. This is very worrisome. There is a system of checks and balances and it's not being followed.
I certainly do not envy the parents' position (nor the husband's), but the fact of the matter is the law says that the husband, being the guardian, can make the decision. But what frustrates me is the method used to allow her to die; removing the feeding tube and dying by thirst and starvation is a very slow death, and if she can feel then it's probably really painful. Her parents are hoping she will recover, but most doctors who have seen her are not. Quote from a Yahoo news article:
Studies of people whose cerebral cortices are damaged in the way Schiavo's is show that their eyes will respond to stimuli such as movement or a human face, but there is no way for them to be conscious of what they are seeing.
Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who has been part of the fight to prolong Schiavo's life, said on Wednesday a review of Schiavo's medical records by a neurologist for Florida's Adult Protective Services indicated she may have been misdiagnosed and was more likely in a state of minimal consciousness rather than in a persistent vegetative state.
Such a condition, in which a patient slips in and out of consciousness, was sometimes mistaken for a persistent vegetative state, said Dr. Joseph Fins of New York Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center. But Schiavo was not in that state, Fins said.
"I think now it can be argued that with the advent of minimally conscious state (as a diagnosis), that permanent vegetative state as a diagnosis becomes much more certain," Fins said in a telephone interview.
It is almost certain that when someone suffers brain damage from a lack of oxygen, they are permanently vegetative, Fins said. Schiavo's brain was starved of oxygen after her heart stopped 15 years ago and most doctors who have examined her say there is no chance of recovery.
It's time to let her go and stop this further prolongation of her misery. I just wish a more humane method was employed. In the Quebecois movie Les Invasions Barbares, the main character is terminally ill with cancer and he chose to go by being administered with an overdose of heroin, in the presence of his loved ones. Personally, I'm for euthanasia if the patient wishes it. There is no point in prolonging a person's misery when chances of recovery are extremely low, even though "miracles" sometimes happen. | 
