"Spina Bifida is a birth defect which involves damage to the spine and nervous system. The vertebrae of the spine and the spinal cord are not formed properly and surgery is usually required immediately after birth. The long-term effect frequently includes weakness or paralysis of the legs and problems with bowels and bladder control. Spina Bifida is sometimes accompanied by hydrocephalus (accumulation [...]
Infanticide is not a horror coming upon us in 1984. It has been here for some time-in the United States, in England, in Canada and around the world. According to the Globe and Mail last June, a doctor, who admits he deliberately ordered an overdose for an infant girl in Edmonton's University Hospital, said Euthanasia is happening everywhere but nobody is talking [...]
For those who would like to see death offered as an option in health care the discussion is now centered on who will be the executioners. Some believe "the burden of responsibility for administering euthanasia would still rest solely on the doctor" (Richard Trubo, An Act of Mercy). Others believe that board made up of diverse kinds of people should have the [...]
Doctors who practice good medical ethics understand their role in dispensing health care. Death and social engineering are not their areas of competence or responsibility. The individual who is sick is their responsibility, not society at large. They recognize the possibility of wrong diagnosis, non-infallible prognosis (where the doomed patient survived). And the possibility of a new cure, all of which prompt [...]
But the new "cool" violence-presented as killing in the name of compassion, and referred to as "concern for the dying" seems to have had a different effect on the public, particularly when it is practiced under "impeccable auspices." For example: Doctors at the Yale-New haven Hospital in the United States and Doctors at the Sick Children's Hospital in Toronto have allowed retarded [...]
The Centre for Life Understanding The following is Part 6 of a 6 part article. Originally published in The Canadian Messenger of the Sacred Heart, Toronto, in 1980, reprinted here with permission. A statement from the Science Council of Canada in the Toronto Star, August 18 1979, notes that "mercy killing could well become the social issue of the next century - [...]
The Centre for Life Understanding The following is Part 3 of a 6-part article. Originally published in The Canadian Messenger of the Sacred Heart, Toronto in 1980, reprinted here with permission. part 3…….. “If the physician presumes to take into consideration in his work whether a life has value or not, the consequences are boundless and the physician becomes the most dangerous [...]
On Thursday, Aug. 25, during the Royal Commission to investigate the deaths of thirty six infants at the Hospital for Sick Children from June 1980 to March 1981, Dr. Richard Rowe, chief cardiologist at the hospital; indicated, while being cross-examined by Metro Toronto police lawyer Barry Percival, that the motive for the killings "would perhaps be that of mercy killing." When asked [...]
In a CP report in the Kamloops Daily Sentinel, May 14, 1983, Dr. William Jory, outgoing president of the BC Medical Association, angrily denounced abortion and euthanasia. "Is it right that in Canada each year, 65,000 embryonic Canadians are flushed down the sluices and toilets of this country?" Dr. Jory asked the association's annual convention in Kelowna. "This is a staggering total [...]
The following is Part 1 of a 6 part article. Originally published in The Canadian Messenger of the Sacred Heart, Toronto, in 1980, reprinted here with permission. Part One: Active euthanasia, passive euthanasia, voluntary euthanasia Dr. Cicely Saunders, medical director of St. Christopher's Hospice in England, is considered a pioneer in the hospice or palliative care movement, aimed at helping people live [...]
The Toronto Star, May 26, reported that an Edmonton doctor, name not given, had "practiced euthanasia with compassion". He had ordered a lethal dose of morphine to put a baby out of its agony - 16 hours after its birth. According to the report, the doctor's license has been suspended and he has left the country. Crown prosecutors are investigating to determine [...]
From abortion to infanticide. Will Euthanasia be next? On Good Friday, April 9, 1982, a baby boy with down's syndrome was born in Bloomington Hospital, Indiana. His parents never told anyone his name because it had been decided to let him starve to death. During his six days of life the nameless child became known as "Baby Boy Doe". Our film critically [...]