« Ed Koch Advises Democrats | Main | Salvation Army »

December 01, 2004

More Groningen Protocol

Hugh has more on the Groningen Protocol:

I can find no major newspaper articles on the "Groningen Protocol" this morning. The front page of the Los Angeles Times --above the fold, center two columns-- carries this headline: "Salmon and Steelhead May Lose Protection." As Drudge carried the Netherlands story yesterday, every newsroom in America knows about the protocol.

Mark D Roberts found an October article on the protocol, which included these details:

"Under the Groningen protocol, if doctors at the hospital think a child is suffering unbearably from a terminal condition, they have the authority to end the child's life. The protocol is likely to be used primarily for newborns, but it covers any child up to age 12.

The hospital, beyond confirming the protocol in general terms, refused to discuss its details.

"It is for very sad cases," said a hospital spokesman, who declined to be identified. "After years of discussions, we made our own protocol to cover the small number of infants born with such severe disabilities that doctors can see they have extreme pain and no hope for life. Our estimate is that it will not be used but 10 to 15 times a year."

A parent's role is limited under the protocol. While experts and critics familiar with the policy said a parent's wishes to let a child live or die naturally most likely would be considered, they note that the decision must be professional, so rests with doctors."

MSM does not care to cover this. You figure out why. In silence is approval, and in approval, an invitation to proceed.

My original post on the Groningen Protocol yesterday is here.

UPDATES:

I ran across a discussion on the Groningen Protocol from October over at Voices of Youth.

31 percent of pediatricians in the Netherlands say that they have killed infants. One-fifth were killed without the consent of parents:

In the Netherlands, Groningen University Hospital has decided its doctors will euthanize children under the age of 12, if doctors believe their suffering is intolerable or if they have an incurable illness. But what does that mean? In many cases, as occurs now with adults, it will become an excuse not to provide proper pain control for children who are dying of potentially agonizing maladies such as cancer, and doing away with them instead. As for those deemed "incurable"--this term is merely a euphemism for killing babies and children who are seriously disabled.

It took the Dutch almost 30 years for their medical practices to fall to the point that Dutch doctors are able to engage in the kind of euthanasia activities that got some German doctors hanged after Nuremberg. For those who object to this assertion by claiming that German doctors killed disabled babies during World War II without consent of parents, so too do many Dutch doctors: Approximately 21 percent of the infant euthanasia deaths occurred without request or consent of parents. Moreover, since when did parents attain the moral right to have their children killed?

A bioethicist warned in September that the line between Dutch and Nazi euthanasia was blurring:

The distance between the Dutch and Nazi practices of euthanasia has disappeared with the Netherlands' recent decision to allow infants and newborns to be put to death, warns a bioethicist.

Dr. Claudia Navarini, professor of the School of Bioethics of the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University, made that assessment in the wake of the August agreement between the Dutch magistracy and the Groningen University Clinic.

The agreement extends the practice of euthanasia, already regulated under a 2002 law, to children under age 12, including newborns.

Another observer, Dr. Gian Luigi Gigli, president of the International Federation of Catholic Medical Associations, similarly warned: "Officially the objective is to put an end to 'unbearable suffering'; in reality, human persons can be killed without their consent."

In statements to ZENIT, Navarini said: "Infant and newborn euthanasia" is justified as "the 'right' of children to have, like their elders, a painless death."

This, she said, is "to propose a death valued according to criteria 'of quality,' like any product ... controlling its manner and moment."

However, there has been a substantial shift in arguments in favor of euthanasia, Navarini noted. At least since the end of World War II, the emphasis in some countries was on "euthanasia by request" or "consensual," she said.

This was an attempt to be distanced from "Nazi euthanasia, which corresponded to state eugenics, doing away -- even without consent and eventually with deceit -- with citizens considered of lesser value, such as the handicapped, mentally ill, the gravely ill and the dying," Navarini continued.

The line between Nazi euthanasia and what is accepted now in the Netherlands has been dulled, she contended, given that in the case of the euthanasia of newborns or children there is no question of acceptance by the patient.

Hence the act of euthanasia "is no longer an 'act of mercy' because of the unbearable pain, but an act of intolerance of the one suffering," the bioethicist said.

"The result is that the distance between the Dutch and Nazi euthanasia practices has been suddenly annulled, and the 'precautions' of the 'most rigorous protocol' of which Dr. Eduard Verhagen, the person in charge of the pediatric section of the Dutch clinic, was speaking, seem less than convincing," she added.

With the recent decision of the Dutch magistracy, we are "before what the president of the National Bioethics Committee" of Italy, "Francesco D'Agostino, defines as 'poorly concealed state pseudo-eugenics,'" contended Navarini.

Wizbang asks:

Can a hospital decide when to kill babies? Can these docs be accused of murder? When does it become the job of a doctor to decided who lives and dies? And when you have socialized medicine when does it become the job of a bean counter to decided who lives and dies because the state can't afford the treatment?

All questions the Europhiles don't want to answer.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer actually did put the Groningen Protocol story on its front page, and Stand to Reason has several essays on euthanasia written from a Christian perspective. (Hat tip Brain Shavings)

Posted at 01:38 PM Pacific