THE SLIPPERY SLOPE – End of Life Issues
Oregon State is on the west coast of the USA. Abortion is legal for 9 months, no reason needed. There’s a busy late-term abortion clinic in the city of Portland. They employ several doctors and are open until late into the evenings.
Oregon State is on the west coast of the USA. Abortion is legal for 9 months, no reason needed. There’s a busy late-term abortion clinic in the city of Portland. They employ several doctors and are open until late into the evenings.
This year, Oregon passed a bill which
targets voiceless patients at the other end of life – those who have dementia
and are unable for whatever reason to get food to their mouths.
They do not have to be fed anymore. Even if
they’re hungry and want food. If they are unable to feed themselves, it’s
considered ‘extraordinary care’ to feed them by spoon. They can be isolated in
a room, denied food and drink and pumped with morphine: ‘comfort care.’
The bill that was passed was couched in
very obscure language. If a person in an advance directive or living will has
said they don’t want to be artificially fed to be kept alive (generally meant
as tube-feeding, or enteral tube feeding) this can now also mean spoon-feeding.
If the person is unable to decide on an advance directive, the carer or an ethics committee may do so – even if the patient accepts food and wants to eat! I find this appalling. As a young nurse I was privileged to spoon feed patients who were unable to feed themselves. Other States are beginning to go this way as well, and I believe the Netherlands has something similar – involuntary euthanasia. It was reported that a family held down their aged, struggling mother in her own home while the doctor lethally injected her; the fact that she had changed her mind was not relevant. [i]
If the person is unable to decide on an advance directive, the carer or an ethics committee may do so – even if the patient accepts food and wants to eat! I find this appalling. As a young nurse I was privileged to spoon feed patients who were unable to feed themselves. Other States are beginning to go this way as well, and I believe the Netherlands has something similar – involuntary euthanasia. It was reported that a family held down their aged, struggling mother in her own home while the doctor lethally injected her; the fact that she had changed her mind was not relevant. [i]
It’s a mistake to weaken disrespect for
Life at any stage. Theresa May recently said that the greatest social problem
the UK faces is loneliness. I wonder if abortion has anything to do with that.
Nobody knows what gifts the aborted child might have brought to the family and
community. Maybe he would have had a caring heart, a spirit of generosity, a
good sense of humour, a cheerful disposition that would have lit up someone’s
day.
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