British Section of the World Federation of Doctors Who Respect Human Life

• End of Life Care
• "The French Way?"
• Oscars attacked
• Genetic Testing postponed
• Stroke Victims denied scans
• "Diane refused euthanasia"
• Living Wills a one-way-street in USA
• Hammersmith Hospital breakthrough?
• Campaign for Sperm donors too dear
• Irishwoman to challenge abortion law
• Abortion 'bad for women'
• "Nurse found dead may have killed 23 patients"
• Recommended Reading

End of Life Care

"The French Way?"

Oscars attacked

Genetic Testing postponed

Stroke Victims denied scans

"Diane refused euthanasia"

Living Wills a one-way-street in USA

Hammersmith Hospital breakthrough?

Campaign for Sperm donors too dear

Irishwoman to challenge abortion law

Abortion 'bad for women'

"Nurse found dead may have killed 23 patients"

Recommended Reading

Lifenews reported on 1 Apr. 05: "Polls leading up to the death of Terri Schiavo made it appear Americans had formed a consensus in favour of ending her life. However, a new Zogby poll with fairer questions shows the nation clearly supporting Terri and her parents and wanting to protect the lives of other disabled patients.

"The Zogby poll found that, if a person becomes incapacitated and has not expressed their preference for medical treatment, as in Terri's case, 43 per cent say "the law presumes that the person wants to live, even if the person is receiving food and water through a tube," while just 30 percent disagree.

"Another Zogby question hits directly on Terri's circumstances:

"If a disabled person is not terminally ill, is not in a coma, and not being kept alive on life support, and they have no written directive, should or should they not be denied food and water," the poll asked.

"A whopping 79 per cent said the patients should not have food and water taken away, while just 9 per cent said yes."

However on 20 June 05 the American Medical Association adopted a resolution opposing any legislation that would make sure disabled and incapacitated patients are not refused life-saving medical care.

Friday Fax, by Austin Ruse, reported on 21 Apr. 05 that the UN now admitted that access to abortion was not effective at reducing maternal mortality.

"Earlier this month, the United Nations Population fund (UNFPA) released its annual report on maternal mortality around the world. The report shows that the most important means of reducing maternal mortality is the presence of a skilled birth attendant with access to emergency obstetrical care. The report contradicts UNFPA's earlier strategy of focussing on access to contraceptives and legalised abortion as the main means of reducing maternal mortality.

"The report acknowledges that 'almost all maternal mortality is avoidable,' because 'all five of the most life-threatening complications can be treated by a professional health worker.'"

The General Assembly of the United Nations on 8 March 05 called on all the nations of the world to ban all forms of human cloning. 84 countries voted in favour of a ban, while only 34 voted against it.

Friday Fax reported: "British Ambassador Emrys Jones Parry expressed the UK's defiance of the Declaration, stating that "the UK government announced this week more than $1 billion of funding over the next three years for biotechnology research, including stem cell research.

"The UK is pressing ahead with destructive embryo research despite a recent medical scandal over its developing trade in Romanian embryos.

"To prevent the exploitation of women, the UK does not permit payment to donors for their eggs. However, to supplement the shortage of eggs in British fertility clinics, the British Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority has allowed UK clinics to import Romanian embryos, despite credible reports that Romanian women are paid high amounts for their eggs."

A proposal in Italy to overturn restrictions there was decisively defeated in a referendum in June. The law limits the number of embryos that can be created to three, forbids sperm or egg donation from outside the couple and prohibits scientific research using embryos.

Josephine Quintavalle (CORE), sums up the situation in Britain:

In the High Court in July 2004 Mr. Justice Munby ruled that Leslie Burke should be able to request tube feeding and hydration in advance of its becoming necessary - and receive it - as well as being able to refuse. The Dept of Health was so appalled by this that they intervened in the Appeal by the General Medical Council. Their solicitor in applying for leave wrote:

"The Secretary of State would wish to put before the Court evidence of the actual cost of ANH to individual cases and the incidence of the provision of ANH (or artificial nutrition and hydration on their own) in NHS hospitals. Again, it is the Secretary of State who is best placed to make these points, as they affect the NHS as a whole; and the Secretary of State who has perhaps the most direct interest (as ultimately the providing and paying party) in being able to address the Court on these matters."

After a critical headline in the Daily Mail, Baroness Ashton told the House of Lords the only grounds on which the Dept. of Health had joined the appeal were that "the judgment could be read as allowing patients to request any life sustaining treatment, even if it was harmful to the patient or if the treatment was not available, such as a transplant or a very expensive experimental treatment that in the clinical judgment of doctors was not appropriate or in the patient's best interest."

On 24th March in debates on the Mental Capacity Bill, when challenged by Lord (John) Patten to explain the discrepancy, she repeated the cover-up. However on 18th May, when the Burke case came to the Appeal Court, Mr. Sales, Counsel for the Dept. of Health, said that judges must respect the will of Parliament in the Mental Capacity Act. (The Doctors' Federation, also, was an Intervener in this case, with the Medical Ethics Alliance and ALERT.) Our solicitor's notes read:

Mr. Sales: "In the light of the 2005 Act, we say it has superseded the [Munby] judgment. A patient has no right to demand a particular form of treatment, the Secretary of State has a question of resources, we say it is a remarkable feature that the Judge suppressed concerns re resources."

Later: "Even if there are no resource concerns, there may still be contra-indications of application of ANH as treatment."(Emphasis ours)

Our QC, Mr. Dingemans, made the point that the patient's best interests and the resources of the NHS were separate issues.In the Judgment handed down on 28th July 2005 which denied Leslie Burke the right to food and water when he becomes unable to communicate, resources were only mentioned once, and that was in quoting Judge Munby (para 27).

Associated Press stated on 30 Nov. 04: "A hospital in the Netherlands, the first [sic] nation to permit euthanasia, recently proposed guidelines for mercy killings of terminally ill [sic] newborns, and then made a startling [sic] revelation. It has already begun carrying out such procedures, which include administering a lethal dose of sedatives." In fact, the first nation to permit euthanasia in modern times was Nazi Germany. The babies killed by doctors are disabled but not all terminally ill, and the practice has been advertised by Dutch doctors for several years.

"In August [2004] the main Dutch doctors' association KNMG urged the Health Ministry to create am independent board to review euthanasia cases for terminally [ill] people 'with no free will', including children, the severely mentally retarded and people left in an irreversible coma after an accident. The Health Ministry is preparing its response." (A.P.)

The New England Journal of Medicine on March 10, 2005 published an article entitled "The Groningen Protocol - Euthanasia in Severely Ill Newborns", by Eduard Verhagen, MD, JD and Pieter J. J. Saner, MD, PhD, at the University Medical Centre, Groningen, the Netherlands. Wesley Smith commented in the National Review (22 March 05): "This was merely the most recent in a series of euthanasia/assisted suicide-promoting articles that have been published in that once august journal in recent years. Perhaps the NEJM should change its name to the New Euthanasia Journal of Medicine."

The Sunday Telegraph on 11 Sept 05 reported that an abortion clinic in Spain is offering financial kickbacks to women with late-term pregnancies to entice them into having illegal terminations. It is also offering commission to helplines supplying the patients. "The clinic, Mediterranean Medica, based in Valencia, circumvents British and Spanish law by carrying out terminations on 26-weeks pregnant women for €2000 (£1,353) and then claiming that they were mentally ill."

In October 2004 the same newspaper revealed that the British Pregnancy Advisory Service was deliberately directing women with healthy post-24 week pregnancies towards the Clinica Ginemedix in Barcelona, where they were given illegal terminations with false paperwork. "A British Government inquiry into the scandal has yet to report its findings." Facts were unearthed by the Pro-Life Alliance.

The Mail on Sunday reported on 4 Sept 05 "Britain's leading abortion clinic has been accused of paying staff cash bonuses to carry out more terminations.

"Marie Stopes International, a registered charity, is alleged to have offered nurses payments of hundreds of pounds if they can increase the number of NHS-funded abortions they perform each day."

On 11 Sept. 05 the Mail on Sunday revealed that private abortion clinics are paying doctors to authorise terminations without their ever meeting the women involved.Anna Furedi, chief executive of the BPAS, confirmed: "Forms issued by the Dept. of Health allow for both doctors to sign, stating that they have not seen the women."

Apparently unaware of current hospital practice, the judges declared (para 34):

"It seems to us that for a doctor deliberately to interrupt life-prolonging treatment in the face of a competent patient's expressed wish to be kept alive, with the "intention of thereby terminating the patient's life, would leave the doctor with no answer to a charge of murder." SOS-NHS - Patients in Danger has records of a number of variations on this scenario, sent by bereaved families, such as 'May 1 have a cup of tea?' followed only by sedation.

Outside the Law Courts on 28th July one of their members, dressed as the Grim Reaper, held up a placard saying "SEDATE - DEHYDRATE - ELIMINATE." This part of the judgment, theoretically, gives them ground for recourse to the law. However, a very recent attempt to persuade the police to investigate a tragic death failed, like many previous ones, due to their deference to hospital doctors.

"The Appeal Court decision has created a dual system of justice, one for people who can speak for themselves and another for those who can't." Wesley J. Smith

One of the most inspiring stories of the past year was the magnificent, doomed effort by so many people in the USA to save the life of Terri Schindler-Schiavo, condemned to die of thirst - as many other patients are, behind closed doors. Her death in a 'Hospice' and the bias of much of the U.S. media, have shown how serious the challenge is to medical ethics at the present time.

Our euthanasia action group, First Do No Harm, is offering an Annual 'Schindler Prize' of £500, in honour of Terri's faithful parents, for the best attempt by a doctor of an attempt like theirs to save life, successful or not. Dr. Richard Lamerton is a trustee of the fund, together with Sir Adrian FitzGerald Bt, Dr. Mary Knowles; and Dr. Jane Campbell, of the Disability Rights Commission, has agreed to join us, which is a great honour. The prize will shortly be advertised.