Amy Welborn has an interesting post up about a medication, ordinarily used as a sleeping pill, that seems to have the effect of temporarily awakening people from what is often termed "a persistent vegetative state." As her source put it:This definitely needs to be researched and after proper vetting, put into appropriate clinical trials. It also illustrates that we really don't know what is going on inside the minds of people diagnosed as permanently unconscious. Moreover, if this is real--and it sure appears that it is--it should give us great pause before pulling the tube feeding of people diagnosed as PVS. The doctors involved also claimed that the drug could have wider application, hoping that "the drug could have uses in all kinds of brain damage, including Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's."Quite so. Why don't we hear more about this in the MSM?
The Terri Schiavo case got huge publicity. People generally are interested in this, not just those with loved ones in such a state. But as the situation in Texas indicates, many in the medical profession and the media don't want to hear about hope for PVSers. I wonder why.
One reason might be that we're now heading down the slippery slope to eugenics. The appetite for ridding ourselves of people who contribute nothing tangible to society and who lack "quality of life" even for themselves continues to grow. The majority of Americans seem to think it's perfectly OK to starve and dehydrate people like Terri Schiavo to death. I myself was invited to do so by my first wife's attending physician fourteen years ago, when she was in a coma with a very poor prognosis. I refused, of course. But that is because I believe, after much study and challenge when younger, that what the Catholic Church teaches about human life and death is true. As societies become more secular, however, inhibitions on murder cannot but continue to fray. If you don't believe me, check out the Netherlands.
