Posted by Alan F. Bachrach, M.D. on July 06, 2001 at 22:29:45:
In Reply to: Re: legal reality posted by Therese B. on July 05, 2001 at 21:42:00:
Therese,
There is no question in my mind that the parents of the severely brain damaged baby did the right thing. My practice is pretty much office based at this point, but I can't begin to tell you how often I have advised families of severely damaged people (for example, people who have had prolonged cardiac arrest and then, unfortunately, been " resuscitated") to "let nature take it's course." Does G-d really want medical intervention in these cases? (obviously unanswerable). Most of these patients will breathe on their own for a short period and then expire. Should they have been kept on a ventillator indefinitely? I don't think so. In some cases the patient's wishes were known. In other cases I advised a course which I felt would cause the least pain to the families. I don't see the case of this baby as being very different. And if this is the course of action, is it less moral to harvest the baby's organ's than it it to harves the organs of older children or adults are are going to be removed from ventilators? (and it is not just elderly people. Children, for example, drown and end up being resucitated from a cardiac standpoint but are left severely brain damaged/vegetative).
I see the frozen fertilized egg question as being very different. These embryos are created outside of the fallopian tubes with no chance of implantation unless it is done artificially. Realize that many "naturally" fertilized eggs fail to implant in the uterus after they emerge from the fallopian tubes. Should these failed implantations be saved somehow since they are (by some peoples' definition) "developing human life"? Should we stop creating embryos in vitro, thus depriving childless couples the chance to have a family? Is there anyone who contemplates that these embryos created in vitro are conscious? I think the answer is NO to all of these questions. I just don't see this issue is being very complicated.