You wouldn't do it to a dog!
Nobody in there right mind would starve a dog or cat to death by cutting off it's food supply, but now by law it's fine to do it to a human being
"LEGAL permission will no longer be required to end life-prolonging care for patients in a permanent vegetative state, the UK Supreme Court has ruled today"
"The ruling will effect up to 24,000 patients with permanent vegetative state (PVS) and minimally conscious state (MCS), meaning they can now be effectively starved and dehydrated to death if the medical staff and relatives agree that this is in their “best interests"
Is it just me or is this just wrong on so many levels
Comments (103)
As thone are the only two options I can think of to end a life in that circumstance.
Any way her attending physician wanted to take all food and liquids away from the mother and just let her die.Before either of her adult children could speak up I told the doctor that the mother wasn't just a number on a hospital chart that there was a human being laying in that hospital bed.All of a sudden that doctor said before anyone gets upset that he would have to go and talk to the doctor in charge.I was already upset.That maybe she may not have been my mother but that I still cared. I also reminded him that doctors take the Hippocratic Oath.
Thankfully we can be kind to our pets and end their misery when they have no quality of life left.
I am very pro death with dignity.
What I mean is, we feel hunger and thirst when in our normal state. Are we capable of doing this in a vegetative state?
It would seem to me barbaric to starve someone with Dementia, they may not be who they used to be but I'll bet they'd know about being starved to death over 3 weeks, so I think you were right to speak up for her.
It could be that you have never seen anyone in a full-on PVS or MCS.
They do an amazing job
My cousin died this way....he was taken off his ventilator and he lived only for 20 mins afterwards....I think natural to me is more, well, natural than injecting someone..but that's just my opinion
I think maybe the process of a person or animal dieing is that the body does not want food or water. It looses appitite and dies without pain????
But in any case we're not talking about people who would die in 20 minutes without a ventilator, rather people who are likely to live up to 3 weeks being starved, not how I'd want to go.
That lethal injection, by the way, there will always be relatives and friends who would consider the person who gave the injection a murderer. Natural death is the only option for humans.
When my lung cancer victim friend of mine was hopeless, we put her in a hospice and she got some injections that didn't make her feel the pain. She was still able to smile, and converse and interact with us. After 5 days she passed away.
I think that'd be my best option.
which is to be allowed to die, not be kept alive.
That's exactly why I called this ruling humane. You cannot be serious, imagining anyone can pop into supreme court, say listen this patient has had it can we let go and the judge says sure, sure.
WEEKS to get the court booking, get second medical opinions, check all the family are on board, THEN sure sure. Maybe.
Oh, and there's no question of lasting weeks once the life-prolonging care stops. A healthy strong human being can survive up to a week without any liquid intake, in cool conditions. The average is 3 to 4 days. Someone who was being kept alive, whose body is long past storing up reserves, would last about 2 days max.
And note 'the body is long past storing reserves'. The body has given up. Time for medicine to give up too.
"The ruling will effect up to 24,000 patients with permanent vegetative state (PVS) and minimally conscious state (MCS), meaning they can now be effectively starved and dehydrated to death if the medical staff and relatives agree that this is in their “best interests”.
People with PVS (awake but not aware) and MCS (awake but only intermittently or partially aware) can breathe without ventilators, but need to have food and fluids by tube (clinically assisted nutrition and hydration or CANH).
These patients are not imminently dying and with good care can live for many years. Some may even regain awareness. But if CANH is withdrawn, then they will die from dehydration and starvation within two or three weeks."
Thanks for the article...what I find interesting is the patient was either never asked or never had any experience of what it was like to be 'under'.....which makes me believe that the person doesn't know what's going on and doesn't feel anything....which makes me think would they even know they were being starved..I like the nature's way of handling these situations....however I do get where u are coming from and empathise with your way of thinKing also...I do know it was the hardest decision my uncle and aunt had to make to turn off my cousins machine and I respect their way of handling it.....it's not easy and hope no one here has to endure that
I think it may come down to individuals having to make a declaration as to how they're to be treated in such circumstances, similar or even added to organ donation forms/cards, that way the decision/responsibility is removed from doctor or family.
But yes it makes you realise that even as young as that we should be making these arrangements now so that it eases the pain on loved ones...
Good topic and makes us think about our futures...that I hope never comes to fruition.