Saying No to the Culture of Death

When my Aunt Julia had a stroke, she became in the eyes of some "a vegetable". In fact my auntie was not a vegetable but she was not able to function at the same level as a healthy human being. She was confined to her bed in a nursing home, and she was not able to comprehend those around her, to the point that she confused the members of her extended family. My auntie was in this state a long time before the promotion of what is termed voluntary euthanasia became the rage. She was allowed to continue to live until she died naturally, and not because it was forced upon her through the withdrawal of her nourishment.

Twenty years or more later, when Terri Schindler-Schiavo endured something that deprived her brain of oxygen (she did not have a heart attack), her ruthless husband pushed to have her feeding tubes removed because it was claimed that she would never regain her full faculties. In fact Michael Schiavo made many false claims to the media about Terri's condition. The late Dr. Richard Cranford, a voluntary euthanasia advocate and doctor of death, was called as an expert witness in the Schiavo vs. Schindler case, and according to him, Terri was PVS to the point that she would never recover. However, as anyone who viewed the videos of Terri knows, Terri was not PVS. She was able to communicate. She was not in a coma. If Terri had been allowed to receive the appropriate level of therapy there was good reason to believe that she could have recovered to a certain extent, such that she could live a comfortable life. Someone who has suffered that form of brain injury can benefit greatly from intensive hydrotherapy. I have personally seen the results of such intense therapy and how a patient who was considered a vegetable when she first began hydrotherapy is now walking with aid. If Terri had received similar treatment then I am sure that Terri could have been able to do the same today. However, it was not going to happen because Michael Schiavo wanted her to be dead.

My point here is that a neurologist such as Dr. Cranford, who was in fact an euthanasia advocate, could easily misdiagnose a patient claiming that the patient is PVS instead of minimally conscious. We have seen several cases now, where the patient has been declared PVS and a legal battle has taken place. In the case of Halley Poutre, the child was facing certain death because of a court order when she pulled out of her coma. She was not PVS.

It is becoming increasingly obvious that there is a high level of misdiagnosis for patients with brain injury. Many are given up for dead, that is they have been declared to be in a vegetative state. In some cases the spouses have insisted upon the withdrawal of their feeding tubes and these patients have been forced to die in a really horrible way. It took Terri Schindler-Schiavo something like 12 agonizing days to die. Others have been fortunate to have a family who loves them and the spouses or family members have done everything possible to speed up their recovery. Some of these patients have remained in what is really a minimally conscious state, for a very long time when suddenly they have come out of that state, and have begun talking to family members. In some cases the brain has repaired itself.

Brain injury patients have been getting a raw deal because they do not have any say in their own treatment. No judge should have allowed Michael Schiavo to pull out the feeding tube from Terri Schiavo. This case showed the lack of justice in the American judicial system. Terri's case is just the tip of the iceberg. How many others have faced the same ordeal of being starved and dehydrated to death because they have a brain injury that has reduced their function? We do not have the right to decide if brain injury patients should be allowed to live or die. The American justice system has let down Terri Schiavo and her family and it has let down countless other families who only want what is best for their loved one. If what Michael Schiavo did to Terri is allowed to be a precedent, then every woman or man who faces domestic violence and who ends up with a brain injury as a result of that violence is in danger of being killed at the whim of a probate judge. This form of injustice must be stamped out, and voluntary euthanasia should be resisted at all levels in the legal and medical professions.