🚀 go-pugleaf

LIFE, DEATH AND RIGHTS
No. 2, November 1994			PART I

An occasional news sheet on eugenics and euthanasia, produced by  
Disability Awareness in Action
11 Belgrave Road
London SW1V IRB
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 71 834 0477  Fax: +44 71 821 93'539
Minicom: +44 71 821 9812

Please send copies of any articles you see on these issuses, or a personal  
opinion piece (2-200 words at most).



UNITED KINGDOM: Attempted Murder
A man who tried to kill his five-day old son walked free from the Old  
Bailey (the central criminal court in England) at the end of July. The  
man's son has Down's syndrome. The 30-year old father of two was crying as  
the judge told him: "It would not be in your son's interest to send you to  
prison. What you did was in a moment of madness." The father told police:  
"I loved our baby like I loved our other boy but I thought he wouldn't  
have a life." He had walked into the maternity ward where his wife and son  
were staying and tried to smother his son with a pillow. When that failed,  
he held a plastic bag across the child's face, then told a midwife: "I  
have suffocated him." The man's defence lawyer claimed doctors had broken  
the news of the infant's Down's syndrome badly: the parents had not been  
together and the child was not with them when each was told. The father  
received a 15-month prison sentence suspended for two years. The man seems  
to have been treated with great sympathy by all involved; thejudge told  
him that he confidently expected him to continue to be an extremely  
responsible parent. It is clear that the father was in considerable  
distress about the diagnosis when he tried to kill his son and has  
experienced considerable remorse since. One of the things this case  
highlight is how diagnosis of impairnnent is delivered to people and to  
relatives. It must be possible to do this in a way that doesn't leave the  
impression of unremitting tragedy. Great care needs to be taken, as most  
cultures still present disabled people as sick, tragic victims and many  
non-disabled people have had little contact with disabled people  
fulfilling a variety of roles in their communities. Doctors and other  
medical professionals may not be the best people to do this. If the man's  
son had not had Down's syndrome, it is unlikely that the police and  
criminal justice system would have responded so positively. Most people  
would probably have some sympathy for the father's distress, and quite a  
number might feel that they would have responded similarly; that indeed  
his was a courageous act. As disabled people, we do need to increase our  
involvement in pre-birth and after-birth counselling of parents of  
disabled children, as well as support for people who become disabled later  
in life. By doing this, we can provide positive role models, educate  
parents and show the whole community that our lives are worthwhile.

TEST CASE
"Maartje, a four-day-old Dutch baby who died after a fatal injection from  
her doctor, is set to make legal history in the Netherlands by  
establishing the boundaries of its liberal euthanasia laws," reported The  
Guardian newspaper in the UK on 5 July 1994. A gynaecologist has been  
prosecuted for injecting a baby who had spina bifida with a drug to  
paralyse breathing on 25 March 1993. A Dutch newspaper stated: "The  
prosecution must among other things answer the question, whether a doctor  
is allowed to end the life of a patient who has not asked for it himself."  
The doctor first consulted two paediatricians, two gynaecologists and a  
neurologist, all of whom advised death for the baby. A British  
paediatrician's opinion: "It is a feature of spinal lesions that they are  
associated with anaesthesia. These children tend to have no sensation in  
the lower limbs and pain control is not usually a problem. Those children  
considered too seriously affected to benefit from radical surgical  
intervention at birth, still require palliative care including surgical  
intervention to prevent distressing deformity. Such infants may enjoy many  
years of fruitful and often rewarding life before other complications  
intervene. Many parents have reasons to be thankful for a child's short  
but satisfying life."

USEFUL MYTH
"A glance at the news suggests most people are more worried about getting  
any treatment in the new commercial NHS, rather than having too much. Yet  
the scare-mongering myth of reluctant patients having the dying process  
prolonged by aggressive over-treatment remains. . . "'Euthanasia: why it  
is still unacceptable', by Ann Sommerville, the Britisjh Medical  
Association New Review, May 1994. Thanks to ALERT (United Kingdom) for the  
above two items.

UNITED STATES
A New Jersey father of three is seeking court permission to commit  
suicide, which, he says, is the only wav he can support his children and  
his ex-wife. As Andrew Kozak, 47, sees it, getting the court to approve  
his "right to die" would allow his children to collect his life insurance.  
Kozak went so far as to submit to the court his will, funeral instructions  
and letters addressed to his children. But Family Court Judge Robert page  
ruled that he did not have the authority to sanction Kozak's suicide.  
Instead he ordered Kozak committed for psychiatric evaluation. Kozak, who  
has maintained all along that he is not'suicidal', was released several  
hours after being admitted because doctors at the hospital found that he  
did not pose a danger and tht he did not need treatment. Under the court  
order, however, Kozak must still undergo more psychiatric evaluation  
before he will be allowed to have unsupervised visits with his children.  
Will Kozak take his own life without court approval? "I can't," he said,  
"I've got legal things to work out." IAETF Update, Vol. 8, No. 5, Sept/Oct  
1994.

UNITED KINGDOM
The British Medical Association is drafting a Code of Practice for doctors  
in connection with advance directives. The Law Commission is also expected  
to report soon on decision-making for incompetent patients. Dr. Peggy  
Norris, Honorary Secretary of the British Section of the World Federation  
of Doctors who Respect Human Life and Chairman of ALERT, said: "Will the  
Committee that is now looking at advance directives insist that since we  
already have legalised euthansia-by-omission - passive euthanasia -  
doctors who refuse to starve and dehydrate their helpless patients to  
death will be obliged to refer them to a compliant death peddler, as is  
demanded in Holland? there, a GP refused to arrange the death of a woman  
suffering from depression. the Dutch voluntary euthansia society supplied  
a Dr. Chabot, who prescribed a lethal concoction. GPs who opt out of the  
euthanasia process have now been reprimanded by the Dutch government."

China's law to "upgrade the quality of newborn babies"
On 27 October, China's legislature passed a law that will prevent those  
deemed to have serious intellectual impairments, mental health  
difficulties or contagious diseases from marrving or having children. The  
official Xinhua news agency in Beijing stated that Chinahad more than 10  
million disabled people "whose births could have been prevented if such a  
law had been in effect when their parents were marrying or having  
children". The Maternal and Infant Health Care Law, ratified by the  
Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, is a diluted version  
of the more accurately-titled Draft Law on Eugenics and Health proposed a  
year ago (see DAA Newsletter Thirteen, January 1993), which prompted an  
intemational outcry and comparisons with Nazi eugenic ambitions. When it  
was first introduced at the end of 1993, the goverriment bluntly said that  
the law was to stop "inferior" births. In October, Xinhua adopted language  
more friendly to the international media by casting its new policy in a  
supposedly positive if euphemistic light: the law will "help reduce births  
of physically or mentally abnormal babies". Despite the 1990 Law for the  
Protection of Disabled Persons and media awareness-raising campaigns,  
there is still much ignorance about and prejudice against disabled people  
in China. Under the new Iaw, effective from June 1995, "those suffering  
from mental and contagious diseases will have to defer their marriages  
when the diseases are serious and likely to affect others". Foetuses  
carrying hereditary diseases will be aborted and women whose "health is  
threatened" will be advised to abort. Although, "the mother, or her  
guardian at the time she lost consciousness, has the final say on whether  
to abort the baby" in this last case, it is likely that disabled women  
will be encouraged to feel that the fact of being pregnant is itself a  
"threat" to their health, whether or not this is the case. The law does  
contain some positive or potentially positive clauses. Sex identification  
before birth will be outlawed except for "medical purposes". Official  
edicts have previously banned the use of ultrasound scans for sex  
identification purposes but to little effect. In rural areas, where most  
families can, in practice, have two children, rather than the official one  
child per couple, the preference for boys is still strong. State hospitals  
earn much-needed cash by offering such a service, followed by abortions of  
female foetuses. The results of this practice can be dramatic. An official  
newspaper, China Information, said in October that in the city of Zhangye,  
in north-west Gansu province, the ratio of newborns was 131 boys to 100  
girls, compared with the normal ration of 106:100. This artificial sex  
imbalance is mirrored in other parts of the world. The attempt to  
eradicate this most deadly form of sex discrimination follows legislation  
in other countries and is to be welcomed, though the exemption of  
screening for "medical purposes" could have wide usage. Also to be  
welcomed is the provision that from next year, the government must provide  
pre-marital and prenatal health care. There is little detail available on  
what this actually means but we must hope that it is to be used for more  
than social, sexual and fertility control by the state.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
E lektronischer                                      Werner-Hilpert-Str. 8
D okumentations- und                                 D - 34117 K a s s e l
I nformations-                                       Tel.: 0561 / 71 33 87
D ienst                                              Fax: 0561 /  71 31 32
                       EDID ist ein Projekt
  der Interessenvertretung 'Selbstbestimmt Leben' Deutschland - ISL e.V.
********************** ISLKS@ASCO.nev.sub.de *****************************
## CrossPoint v3.02 ##