Medical Ethicist Says ‘Sanctity of Life Law Has Gone Too Far’ — Law Should Allow Some Patients to be Dehydrated to Death
- Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:16pm by
Liz Klimas
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A recent editorial in the British Medical Journal has pro-lifers up in arms over an ethicist’s suggestion that keeping some patients alive would lead to depleting ”severely resource limited healthcare services.” The ethicist authoring this piece states that it would apply to life-support for patients who may have previously expressed not wanting the life-extending services.

Raanan Gillon (Photo: Birkbeck University of London)
Raanan Gillon, emeritus professor of medical ethics and former chairman of the Institute of Medical Ethics, writes in the British Medical Journal that a 2011 court decision in Britain regarding a brain dead woman whose family wanted to take her off life-prolonging resources but were denied is a ruling that “distorts healthcare provision, healthcare values, and common sense.”
(Related: Ethicists Argue in Favor of ‘After-Birth Abortions‘ as Newborns ’Are Not Persons’)
More specifically, the case decided in September 2011 ruled that the woman who had been kept alive through a feeding tube for more than eight years would not be given the “right to die.” The Guardian reported at the time that the family of the woman, legally referred to as “M,” had requested she be taken off the supply of nutrients and water being given to her, but the high court decided despite the “number of negative aspects” in M’s life, she also had some “positive elements.”
(Related: Should Man With Paralyzing Stroke But Intact Mind Be Give the ‘Right to Die’?)
Judge Justice Baker said in the precedent-setting ruling that he “[accepted] the evidence of the carers,“ but her life is ”not without pleasures, albeit small ones.” Acknowledging the support of the family and supposing their distress at his final decision, Baker still ruled that M’s current life state would not justify withdrawal of life support.
Gillon is writing that Baker’s ruling is evidence of the “sanctity of life law [going] too far.”
In the prominent medical journal, Gillon expresses in his editorial two aspects of Baker’s judgement that he considers “profoundly disturbing.” He first calls out a couple choice quotes from Baker’s 2011 ruling:
[...] the judge emphasised that in deciding whether such withdrawal would be in these patients’ best interests it would “be wrong to attach significant weight” to their previously expressed values, wishes, and views unless these had been expressed in a legally valid and applicable advance decision. What should be given great “though not absolute” weight was the sanctity of life. The judge said (paragraph 230), “[given] the importance of the sanctity of life, and the fatal consequences of withdrawing treatment, and the absence of an advance decision that complied with the requirements previously specified by the common law and now under statute, it would in my judgment be wrong to attach significant weight to those statements made prior to her collapse.”
What first concerns Gillon is not honoring with “significant weight” the wishes of the patient before they entered this compromised condition. Secondly, Gillon calls out the ruling for implying that “all decisions about starting or stopping life prolonging treatment [...] should be brought to the Court of Protection” if the patient is in a minimally conscious state. Gillon expounds further on this point saying that he sees this ruling as implying in future cases that if a patient in a “minimally conscious state” or higher who had not written a valid statement to avoid any life-prolonging treatment, then their case would need to go to court before withholding any treatment that would extend life.
Ultimately, Gillon believes the judgement by Baker “[threatens] to skew the delivery of severely resource limited healthcare services towards providing non-beneficial or minimally beneficial life prolonging treatments including artificial nutrition and hydration to thousands of severely demented patients whose families and friends believe they would not have wanted such treatment.”
It is this phrase that pro-life sites and supporters have quickly picked up on. LifeSiteNews, in its article titled “Dehydrate dementia patients to death to save money: British Medical Journal editorial”, reports Anthony Ozimic with the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children saying Gillon’s perspective is similar to that of eugenics:
“What is particularly disturbing about Professor Gillon’s opinions is that he is judging certain disabled people as having lives unworthy of life, balancing those lives against the needs of other patients and seeking to justify killing the disabled on the grounds of rationing,” Ozimic told LifeSiteNews.com.
“Such a utilitarian calculus is in substance no difference to the calculus made during World War II by the German authorities: that the disabled should die so that wounded soldiers could live. In any case, assisted food and fluids are basic nursing care, not futile medical treatments.”
LifeSiteNews also writes that the opinion held by Gillon, however “shocking,” is actually one held by many mainstream ethicists.
Peter Saunders, a former general surgeon and CEO of Christian Medical Fellowship, writes on his blog (via National Right to Life News) that Gillon is “very selective” with the facts he calls out from M’s case. Saunders, who has previously followed M’s situation, continues writing:
[...] M had some awareness of herself and her environment, some understanding of language, occasionally spoke, appeared to be able to appreciate some things that were said to her and responded to music. Although she regularly experienced pain, this was not constant or extreme, and her condition was stable. And unlike dementia patients, who are terminally ill, she had a non-progressive condition.
Gillon’s suggestion, that severely demented and brain-damaged people should be sedated, starved and dehydrated to death on the basis of their friends and relatives vague and contradictory recollections of ‘what they would have wanted’ would create a most dangerous precedent and place us on a very slippery slope indeed.
What do you think of the arguments? Would Gillon’s position lead to a “slippery slope” where “severely demented and brain-damaged people” could be allowed to die through denial of treatment? Or, is the British court’s decision, as Gillon sees it, simply driving resources toward patients whose condition many never improve and who may never have wanted it in the first place? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
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Comments (127)
Snooze
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:14pmAdd your comments
Report Post »G-WHIZ
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:39pmNAZI-GERMANY…anyone?? Creep…creep…creep…King’O has arrived! no-more congress…no fair fed-courts(all lefti-commies)…at least 4MuslimBrotherhoodies in HIS cabinet writing regulations by the thousands! There are 8-other NEW WORLD ORDER-treaties tobe flushed through congress so we can see what’s in them! Just one(1) has sofar been delayed/temporarilly by a few marginal-votes in the sennate! Wher and when will the [other-eight] come “up” for the vote?? Any-[one] can-and-will send USA into the NEW WORLD ORDER!
Report Post »WAKEUPUSA2012
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:46pmWhen will you war mongering neocons realize that the NWO wants us dead! All of US.
Report Post »MittensKittens
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:53pm1. This is a British ethicist….
Report Post »2. enough said
Polwatcher
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:58pmBig government can giveth and big government can taketh away. A hospital is for healing. Killing someone can be done anywhere unless of course the hospital is being used as a cover for something else. If the hospital doesn’t want to try heal a patient, they should turn the patient away so the patient can go elsewhere for medical care. These so called “doctors” that think like this are not doctors at all. They are some kind of psycopath trying to play God and using the institutions of government to do it. I dare say that most people would not want to be treated by such a psycopath.
Report Post »Redwood Elf
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 2:25pm“British Ethicist” is an Oxymoron when applied to their socialized medicine system. Remember, this is the country where you can wind up sitting in an Ambulance for 8+ hours because they won’t drop you off at the Hospital until they are sure you can be seen within 3 hours.
Obamacare fans: This is the future you’re asking for.
Report Post »Rayblue
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 2:26pmIt takes about 5 days in most cases. It’s one of the worst things that can be done to a human. I won’t describe the things that happen. It wouldn’t help. But be sure, it will hang over your head till the day it’s your turn.
Report Post »termyt
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 2:53pmTo my overlords, leaders, and betters:
Should the time come where you decide it is my time to die regardless of any other factors, please be so kind as to put a bullet in my brain instead of humanely starving me to death or letting me die of thirst. At least smoother me. But then, perhaps you find joy in the agonizing suffering of those lesser than you?
Polwatcher
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 3:40pmI believe we are allowed to engage in self defense to protect someone from killing us. Are we not? These psycopathic doctors probably take measures to be sure that their are no weapons accessible to the patient and they probably make sure that they only starve or dehydrate those who are too weak to resist.
Report Post »Chuck Stein
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 4:39pmGood thing that there are medical ethicists around. Who knows what sort of crazy ideas would be flying around without them. *** end sarc ***
Report Post »pavepaws
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 4:40pmPerhaps he could demonstrate his theory on himself.
Report Post »urrybr
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 5:19pmSo . . . is this guy first??????????????
Report Post »Metalstr8jckt
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 5:47pmWhen the emperor in accordance with a UN declaration declares all privately held arms must be turned in, Thirty percent will dutifully(and foolishly) do so. The remnant will be starved out, and bio-medically ‘treated’ with several compounds inserted into their last bastion locales. It worked for the conquistadors in 16th century in Mezzo-America and despots do pay attention to history in regards to eliminating undesirable elements. Disease is a silent foe.
Report Post »hayesstephen
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 6:34pmEvery year we read where some EXPERT wants to kill those who are no longer useful to society. It won’t be long before they start killing us for expressing an opinion that differs from the government, oh wait they’re doing that in muslim countries. Nobama can’t wait to get shira law here in the U.S. If he get’s re-elected and he will through hook or crook, non mulims (Christians if you were not able to understand what I was hinting at) will start dying in droves. I’m committing a sin here, but I hope I live long enough to see the faces of Caucasian Liberal Trash as they have their heads cut off.Useful fools will get theirs from the peace loving muslims.
Report Post »Silversmith
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 8:29pmAs if this isn’t done already here in the US. My family euthanized my Mother – I was against it. It took 15 days for her to pass. No offense Rayblue, but 5 days is what they will tell you to get you to okay the removal of the feeding tube. Those who pass that quickly are usually ready to go.
My family is forever changed, as am I. The last thing we need to do is make this easier.
Silversmith
Report Post »rickc34
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 10:25pmThis is the Health care model that Obama is going to use, if the Doctor to not think you are worth saving they will let you die by not treating the symptoms . Have you ever seen a person with liver or renal failure die ? Not a pretty picture unless the symptoms are managed I have instructed patients and their family members on doing a paracentesis for acites in the home to help the patient be more comfortable in their last days so they could breath comfortably and not feel like they would explode from all the fluid building up, this would stop even though the containers are not that expensive the goverment would still look at it as a savings, just little things like that. Welcome to the Obama care that the left wanted so badly. Good luck finding a good Doctor that will take that insurance and have fun waiting to see the Doctor that does.
Report Post »HoratiusAtTheBridge
Posted on July 20, 2012 at 12:00amIncreasingly you see little blurbs here & there like this. The Progressives did not stop with their demonic thirst to kill unborn babies. In the name of their faceless, godless “society” or “greater good”, they see anything that THEY deem troublesome as disposable. The old, the handicapped – either mentally or physically, and even the injured and subsequently deemed WASTEFUL are fair game for this self-righteous cleansing. Overweight? Uh-oh! Obama himself was all about pushing a law to allow babies who survived attempted murder (“choice”), to be basically left in a dying room until they died. That’s the kind of evil common in places like China. Dehydration is one of the slowest & most horrifically painful ways to die. Why are these modern day evil sh** human demons called things like “doctor” & ETHICIST? What is healing or ethical about abortion, killing the inconvenient, or using human “fetuses” (they are babies, you bastards) for product development & genetic experimentation. The flippin’ Nazis won, folks – they morphed into something else & are now brazen enough to speak publicly about their blood-lust & disregard for life. I do not think that we who follow Christ will have to witness the Great White Throne of Judgement & these pitiful wretches being cast into the lake of fire – and it tasks me as I am commanded to love even these monsters… but I read these stories & look at those evil eyes – I want to be the one there – kicking their a**es right off the edge
Report Post »Deuteronomy22
Posted on July 20, 2012 at 7:02amYou know who pays the 100-200 thousand dollars a year it costs to keep a brain dead person on a vent, tube fed ad artificially hydrated? Hint the taxpayers. So you are all for billions to prevent a death which is occurring as nature and God has permitted for centuries but heaven forbid the government tax you for childhood nutrition. Hypocracy at it’s finests brought to you by the Blaze idiot brigade.
Report Post »muffythetuffy
Posted on July 20, 2012 at 3:38pmJohn Roberts Death Panels. Its Just A TAX.
Kill the elderly, kill all of them.
Report Post »joony
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:14pmThe Bible hits the nail on the head:
Proverbs 12:10
A righteous man regards the life of his animal,
Report Post »But the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.
shogun459
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:11pmFirst they will get us used to Killing the defenseless unborn, then the defenseless ill and elderly.
One step at a time, same way they did it in Germany, I know I lived there.
Fuhrer simply means leader.
Report Post »Obama is called the messiah by some in the press today.
NHwinter
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:57pmI think we should dehydrate him to death. The world would be better without people like him in it.
Report Post »Snowleopard {gallery of cat folks}
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:55pmWelcome to the future under ObamaCare if it is not gutted by the new Congress coming in this Nov.
Report Post »MasterJoshua7
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 3:28pmMy thoughts exactly.
Report Post »Metalstr8jckt
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 5:56pmHis Hippocratic oath gave him the hot line to Heaven. “First do no harm” has been replaced with his false godhead. He believes through his indoctrination that he will decide British folks final solution. Where is your black uniform doctor? Replete with “deaths head” regalia? Herr’ Mengele calls from the Inferno.
Report Post »pamela kay
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 10:47pmYou could not be more right .This is what the New World Order is about. Obama and the progressives are pushing for the same here.
Report Post »Nepenthe
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:45pmPersonal freedom means personal freedom. The same personal freedom that allows a 30 year old nurse to not take part in abortions also always a 65 year old cancer patient to ask a doctor to end their life. Personal freedom is personal freedom, but only if you actually believe in limited government interference in your life, which many people on both the left and right do not.
Report Post »PATTY HENRY
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:55pmIF there is ANYONE over the age of 50 who votes for this demon-in-chief in this election, you deserve the DEATH PANEL that he will install. HE has no respect for America, no respect for white people, no respect for women, no respect for parents, no respect for grandparents, no respect for tradition, no respect for unborn, new born, no respect for Freedom, no respect for life period.
Senior who vote for Obama do so at their own peril.
Report Post »John 3:16
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:06pmThis is just another slippery slope that leads to the degrading of human life. If you really believe in freedom, you don’t ask someone else to do the dirty job of killing you. Man up and kill yourself if you want the job done. What about the .001% of patients that are incapable of the self murder… Too damn bad. Not giving major life support to people who don’t want it, is no problem,: a living will works here. This person can say they don’t want it and they can refuse their own food and water.Anything else is asking another to help commit murder. There are people like this non-ethicist that needs to kill himself. Just more Dr. Drip thye losing murderer.
Report Post »tzion
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:27pmBy that argument the doctor would have the right to refuse that request.
Report Post »RedManBlueState
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 2:07pmIf you want to kill yourself, go for it. The doctor’s first duty is “DO NO HARM.”
Report Post »Temporal
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:44pmState controlled healthcare enables this argument as the “limited resources” means “limited GOVERNMENT funding.” As soon as anything becomes government funded, then anything that touches on the issue becomes the government’s domain, be it the time to die or what foods you eat.
Report Post »Free2speakRN
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:38pmHow about the 130,000 prematurely euthanized patients/year in the UK for lack of beds. Sanctity of life has gone too far?? These ‘Ethicists’ wouldn‘t be too bad if they didn’t lack morality.
Report Post »RANGER1965
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:36pmThis article reminds me of the problems of a “Living Will”
Most people think that they will save their familys and loved ones from unecessary suffering, and expense by putting a do not recessitate clause, and “no heroic effort” clause in their wills. Ironically Christians are quick to sign off on this
They envision a bleak scene of being in a hospital surrounded by grieving and concerned loved ones while brain dead, but being kept alive by machines. Having no fear of death, and not wanting to put their family through some terrible trial they ignorantly sign their own fate on a piece of paper.
What these people don’t realize is that life is messy, and it’s rarely a clear cut case like the example above, and what you are doing is putting your life in the hands of a doctor and his interpretation of your wishes.
Accept the fact that life, dying, and death might be natural but are always, messy, complex, and hard.
Report Post »deeberj
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:22pmIf you include in your living will that you have a specific person making decisions for you and not your doctors it’s better. I can’t remember what that person is called, but most ready made living wills do not have it. You have to add it. My mom has my sister who is a nurse and understands what my mom wants and does not want.
I don’t have a living will. Let them all fight about it when I’m lying there mostly dead.
Report Post »jharper
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:51pmYou are so right. My father had a living will. The was 84, already had two open heart surgerys, renal failure and congestive heart failure. Then his mitrol value blew. The doctors had a hissy fit when we said we wanted to let him go. They said that the living will states “when there is no hope” and demanded there was hope if he had the value replaced. They did the surgery. He was in ICU for SIX MONTHS before he died. The bill was over a million dollars. One of the doctors showed up at the funeral. I walked up to him and said, “We should have had this funeral six months ago!” The suffering that our family went through was horrible, expecially my half blind elderly mother. That was 13 years ago and my mom and I are still angry about it. She is now 91 years old, has had 2 defibulators, and 2 pace makers. Her heart doesn’t work at all any more. She is very unsteady on her feet, can’t see, and is in an assisted living facility that cost over $5,000 a month. Here is a question. I have an old dog. Her hips always go out on her, she poops her bed everynight, Her bladder leaks, her eyes are actually rejecting her cornea’s, she has large tumors all over and a skin condition. Should I dehydrate her to death or take her to the vet and have her put down.?
Report Post »jzs
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 3:03pmjharper, I read a lot of kneejerk and uniformed opinions here but yours was a great post.
Report Post »Al J Zira
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:35pmThey’re not happy so lets do them a favor and kill them. I mean after all, we owe it them!
Report Post »This is where socialized medicine leads. They’re worried about a slippery slope, this is an avalanche.
rpp
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:35pmWith government in charge of medicine and medical school now discriminating against applicants who express an opinion other than a utilitarian humanistic view, it is inevitable that a happy and long retirement, as well as long term care facilities, will be replaced by euthanasia “resorts”.
Report Post »deeberj
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:33pmWhy is it that so many medical ethicists are also so far left they’ve fallen off the edge?
Report Post »historyguy48
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:32pmComrades, death panels, what death panels. They are resource allocation panels, not death panels!
Report Post »Thors Hammer
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:28pmWhat ‘Sanctity of life’? Life has been worth 0 since Roe V Wade discovered some mythical ‘right’ to kill your baby, (whether or not the father agreed!) or even after the kids had been around a year or two; we’ll just blame it on post-partum depression. When whoever wrote Hillary‘s book called it ’It Takes A Village’ what they really meant was that it takes a village to have enough children so that a few have the opportunity to grow into adulthood. I expect, next, the courts will find that it’s OK to kill someone – related or not – because you‘re just helping Mama with an ’extremely late-term abortion’.
Report Post »Mutiny
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:28pmWoo Hoo, Romney/Obamacare. Thanks guys!!!
Report Post »RJJinGadsden
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:27pmSounds like those death panels that Sarah Palin was excoriated for mentioning.
Report Post »Laureen1
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:27pmMust have changed the meaning of Ethicists while I slept. Sounds like those other “Ethicists” in Europe who stated that a baby once born is still not considered human until it reaches approximately age 2 and based on that “fact” they can still be aborted. I guess the term “aborted” eases their consciences so they don’t use the word “murderer”.
The world is unraveling. The end game of liberalism is showing its colors bright and clear. Better choose sides soon people!
Report Post »Al J Zira
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:42pmYou‘re right and that’s what progressives do: they change the meaning of things to suit their needs.
Report Post »deeberj
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:09pmThere is an ethicist who used to work at Rowan University in Glassboro NJ who believes in after birth abortion. I can‘t remember his name or if he’s still there. There was a big uproar but they hired and kept him for at least awhile.
Report Post »blackyb
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:27pmNote the name of this murderer. He sounds a bit foreign.
Report Post »Too_Far_Gone
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:26pmThis jackass and probably a thousand more behind him, evil in full bloom ..
Report Post »RJJinGadsden
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:28pmJack Kevorkian 2.0
Report Post »blackyb
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:25pmIf someone does my family like this and I find it out. They are dead meat. They will be next in line to be dehydrated. So when fools like this think they will get away with murdering innocents, they may better rethink their position on this because I am not the only person who feels like this.
Report Post »blackyb
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:29pmThere are many more than a thousand who feel like I too, too.
Report Post »JRook
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:37pmThis is exactly where many conservative Republicans show their extreme irrationality. They rant about the cost of Medicare, while ignoring the fact that 1/3rd. of the money is spent in the last 6 months of life. In most instances under a quality of life that no one wants for themselves. Case in point. When my father in his last 3 months due to bone cancer, a surgeon wanted to remove a tumor on his jaw. I made a point of have the oncologist rip the surgeon up for a clear example where $$$ were a much higher priority than quality of life or ethics. People should be allowed to die with dignity, not as testimonials to medical technology and revenue generators for critical care units.
Report Post »deeberj
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:03pmjkook, I mean jrook – dying with dignity. What a nice sounding phrase! You libs use it all the time. Who could possibly disagree with having dignity?
Dignity is not being dehydrated to death.
Report Post »RJJinGadsden
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 1:06pmJCROOK, This is again where you have your head up your fourth point of contact. Medicare/Medicaid is so rife with the ability to be defrauded that even organized crime has for a couple of decades established strawman businesses to make it easy for them to bilk the government for billions a year. Then there are simple small time frauds but in massive multiples that further suck the funds from the government. The federal government’s failure to be bean counters and to try and track down these frauds is reprehensible. Furthermore, although I posted this yesterday it bares repeating. I read an article back during the first Clinton term that exposed that for every dollar the government put into federal entitlements, to include Medicare/Medicaid was filtered down to about thirty three cents that would be spent on the programs. Not very efficient is it? That kind of blood letting in the private sector would put them out of business. So, our biggest gripe is not that the programs exist, and we can do nothing about it now. But, rather the massive wastes in these entitlement programs. BTW, entitlements equals almost 70% of our annual expenditures. While the big, bad military is close to 7%.
Report Post »MeteoricLimbo
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:24pmGotta prime the pump for Obamacare.
Report Post »Is it just me or did this guy use to make original and extra crispy chicken?
blackyb
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:28pmMy guess he doesn‘t like ’pig.’
Report Post »RJJinGadsden
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:30pmLOL, only if he let the chickens dehydrate to death. The lack of moisture helps with the extra crispy part.
Report Post »woodyee
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:23pmThis fruit-cake is nothing but a shill setting us up for what is to be part of Obammy-care, erah, “death with dignity”.. We were warned about it, and now it begins.
Report Post »blackyb
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:22pmThese after birth abortions? Who does he think he is King Herod?
Report Post »blackyb
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:21pmWell let him start this dehydration on himself and let us know how that works out.
Report Post »cookcountypatriot
Posted on July 19, 2012 at 12:19pmdr. mengele would be so proud to know that nazism lives…in progressive minds of course
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