You know why they do it?  They do it to "cover their *sses."  The church and
medical profession both believe that disability is an individual's issue.
They do not see it as a societal issue.  

-----Original Message-----
From: Cerebral Palsy List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
ken barber
Sent: Sunday, November 12, 2006 5:22 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [Fwd: [disabilitystudies] FWD Some sick babies must be allowed
to die, says Church]

about the same assessment was given to my parents. 

--- Rayna <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Now the Church of England is on the bandwagon.   I
> feel so sick reading 
> this.  How does nobody realise that doctors
> assessments of prem babies 
> can be wrong.   The doctors said when I was born, in
> semi-rural New 
> Zealand in 1974, that there was one in a hundred
> chance of me surviving, 
> and if I survived I would be a vegetable, and not be
> able to walk or 
> talk.  I can do both, the walking not so well, and
> the talking *too* 
> well for the comfort of a lot of people. ;-)  
> They were clearly way off in their assessments, and
> this group alone has 
> dozens of those sorts of stories, let alone the
> disability community at 
> large.  The doctors must *know* how inaccurate their
> assessments are, we 
> haven't all vanished into back rooms somewhere, but
> they ignore our 
> existence.
> 
> :-(
> 
> Rayna
> 
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: 	[disabilitystudies] FWD Some sick babies
> must be allowed to 
> die, says Church
> Date: 	Sun, 12 Nov 2006 01:01:59 -0000
> From: 	Keith Armstrong <[log in to unmask]>
> Reply-To: 	[log in to unmask]
> To: 	[log in to unmask]
> 
> 
> 
> Church of England leaders want doctors to be given
> the right to
> withhold treatment from seriously disabled newborn
> babies in
> exceptional circumstances. The move is expected to
> spark massive
> controversy.
> 
> The church leaders' call for some children to be
> allowed to die -
> overriding the presumption that life should be
> preserved at any cost -
> comes in response to an independent inquiry, which
> is to be published
> this week, into the ethics of resuscitating and
> treating extremely
> premature babies.
> 
> The decision by religious leaders to accept that in
> some rare cases it
> may be better to end life than to artificially
> prolong it is a
> landmark for the church. The Rt Rev Tom Butler,
> Bishop of Southwark
> and vice chair of public affairs of the
> 
> Mission and Public Affairs Council, states in the
> church's submission
> to the inquiry, that 'it may in some circumstances
> be right to choose
> to withhold or withdraw treatment, knowing it will
> possibly, probably,
> or even certainly result in death'.
> 
> The church's report does not spell out which medical
> conditions might
> justify a decision to allow babies to die but they
> are likely to be
> those agonising dilemmas such as the one faced by
> the parents of
> Charlotte Wyatt, who was born three months
> prematurely, weighing only
> 1lb and with severe brain and lung damage.
> 
> The report also suggests the enormous cost
> implications to the NHS of
> keeping very premature and sick babies alive with
> invasive medical
> care and the burden on the parents should also be
> taken into
> consideration.
> 
> Doctors wanted to switch off Charlotte's life
> support machine because
> they said her severe mental and physical handicaps
> left her in
> constant pain with an 'intolerable' quality of life.
> They pointed out
> that every time she had an infection, staff would
> have to give
> injections or set up drips that caused yet more
> pain.
> 
> After the case went through the courts, the child,
> now three, survived
> but with severe disabilities. She is now in care as
> her estranged
> parents found it too hard to meet her 24-hour
> healthcare needs.
> 
> The church's call comes in their submission to the
> Nuffield Council on
> Bioethics, an independent body that publishes
> guidelines on how
> doctors should deal with ethical issues. The council
> set up the
> inquiry nearly two years ago in order to consider
> the implications of
> advances which enable babies to be born halfway
> through pregnancy and
> kept alive.
> 
> Their statement comes the week after one of
> Britain's royal medical
> colleges called for a public discussion over whether
> to permit the
> euthanasia of the sickest babies. The proposal from
> Royal College of
> Obstetricians and Gynaecologists was welcomed by
> geneticists and
> medical ethicists, but described it as social
> engineering by others.
> 
> In its submission, the Church of England said that
> although it could
> not accept the argument that the life of any baby
> was not worth
> living, there are 'strong proportionate reasons' for
> 'overriding the
> presupposition that life should be maintained'.
> 'There may be
> occasions where, for a Christian, compassion will
> override the "rule"
> that life should inevitably be preserved,' wrote
> Butler.
> 'Disproportionate treatment for the sake of
> prolonging life is an
> example of this.'
> 
> The church states that it would support the
> withdrawal of treatment
> only if all reasonable alternatives had been fully
> considered 'so that
> the possibly lethal act would only be performed with
> manifest reluctance'.
> 
> But it accepted there were a range of reasons why
> the final decision
> to withdraw or refuse treatment should be made,
> including the question
> of cost. 'Great caution should be exercised in
> bringing questions of
> cost into the equation when considering what
> treatment might be
> provided,' wrote Butler. 'The principle of justice
> inevitably means
> that the potential cost of treatment itself, the
> longer term costs of
> healthcare and education and opportunity cost to the
> NHS in terms of
> saving other lives have to be considered.'
> 
> Very premature babies run a higher risk of brain
> damage and
> disability. If they are born at 22 weeks, 98 per
> cent of them die,
> though by 26 weeks the chances of survival has risen
> to 80 per cent.
> Different counties have different policies for very
> tiny infants.
> 
> Babies born before 25 weeks are not given medical
> treatment in the
> Netherlands and in certain conditions, euthanasia is
> permitted.
> 
> When the Nuffield Council produces its long-awaited
> report on
> Thursday, it is expected to reject a Dutch-style
> limit, with hospitals
> required to let a baby below a certain age die,
> arguing that even two
> infants born at exactly the same age can vary
> widely. Instead, they
> are likely to call for much clearer guidelines to
> doctors about the
> issues of viability.
> 
> Parents of very premature infants will also be asked
> to start talking
> to doctors at a much earlier stage about the likely
> health outcome of
> their babies, so that they can be prepared for the
> worst.
> 
=== message truncated ===



 
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