Here is a comment about a controversial section of HR 3200, the health care bill.
Statement by House GOP Leaders Boehner and McCotter
on End-of-Life Treatment Counseling in
Democrats’ Health Care Legislation
WASHINGTON, DC – House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) and Republican Policy Committee Chairman Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI) today issued the following joint statement regarding a provision targeting seniors contained in Section 1233 of H.R. 3200:
“Section 1233 of the House-drafted legislation encourages health care providers to provide their Medicare patients with counseling on ‘the use of artificially administered nutrition and hydration’ and other end of life treatments, and may place seniors in situations where they feel pressured to sign end of life directives they would not otherwise sign. This provision may start us down a treacherous path toward government-encouraged euthanasia if enacted into law. At a minimum this legislative language deserves a full and open public debate – the sort of debate that is impossible to have under the politically-driven deadlines Democratic leaders have arbitrarily set for enactment of a health care bill.
“This provision of the legislation is a throwback to 1977, when the old Department of Health Education and Welfare proposed federal promotion of living wills for cost-savings purposes described as 'enormous.' At that time, the late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin of Chicago decried this effort by saying: 'The message is clear: government can save money by encouraging old people to die a little sooner than they otherwise would. Instead of being regarded with reverence, and cherished, human life is subject in this view to a utilitarian cost-benefit calculus and can be sacrificed to serve fiscal policy and the sacred imperative of trimming a budget.'
“With three states having legalized physician-assisted suicide, this provision could create a slippery slope for a more permissive environment for euthanasia, mercy-killing and physician-assisted suicide because it does not clearly exclude counseling about the supposed benefits of killing oneself.
“Health care reform that fails to protect the sanctity and dignity of all human life is not reform at all.”
“This provision of the legislation is a throwback to 1977, when the old Department of Health Education and Welfare proposed federal promotion of living wills for cost-savings purposes described as 'enormous.' At that time, the late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin of Chicago decried this effort by saying: 'The message is clear: government can save money by encouraging old people to die a little sooner than they otherwise would. Instead of being regarded with reverence, and cherished, human life is subject in this view to a utilitarian cost-benefit calculus and can be sacrificed to serve fiscal policy and the sacred imperative of trimming a budget.'
“With three states having legalized physician-assisted suicide, this provision could create a slippery slope for a more permissive environment for euthanasia, mercy-killing and physician-assisted suicide because it does not clearly exclude counseling about the supposed benefits of killing oneself.
“Health care reform that fails to protect the sanctity and dignity of all human life is not reform at all.”
I was with you until the final sentence, C-Rox. That the idea is a bad one, whether in regards to private or nationalized health insurance, there is no doubt. The difference is that under a national system the dissemination of this info becomes mandatory, and a function of the state.
I am no friend of HMOs and medical insurance companies, and having worked in the financial side of the health industry for 16 years, I fully appreciate the need for reform. Why we assume, however, that reform must entail a government takeover is beyond me.
Posted by: Rob G | July 25, 2009 at 07:50 AM
Funny how the advocates of "choice" for bearing children become the advocates of 'no choices at all" when it comes to paying the bills for bearing children. My only hope is that there remains enough native skepticism about one of the Three Big Lies ("I'm from the government and I'm here to help you") that ObamaCare will founder of its own dead weight.
Posted by: Deacon Michael D. Harmon | July 25, 2009 at 09:30 AM
Washington DC is so broke that I doubt if it can be fixed. The best thing they could do is absolutely nothing, but that is not going to happen. The last time things were this scary was the mid-60's and you know where things have gone since then (I can hear the flushing sound now).
Posted by: Mr-Bob | July 26, 2009 at 01:59 PM
What of those, such as myself, who have living wills in place purely out of choice and not because some HMO or other entity counseled us in the option? If I choose not to accept artificial means of keeping breath or nourishment in my body when I have lost the ability to breathe or swallow on my own, I see that no differently than the person with terminal cancer who chooses to cease chemotherapy. Are we to always utilize every possible method, regardless of the impossibility of recovery, to keep our earthly bodies alive when we have made a rational decision to the contrary beforehand?
Posted by: Shane | July 26, 2009 at 07:34 PM
ViewPoint:
The "lawmakers" are becoming arrogant, indifferent (did they even read this bill) and morally repugnant to the fundamental rights of our most frail and vulnerable citizens.
This "health care" bill legally provides the medical care-giver/provider a right to starve a patient to death (it is obvious why starvation is presented as an end-of-life way to finish off a patient in this bill.
It gets around the fact that there is no federal legal right to provide euthanasia to patients who either want to die or someone else wants them to die -- families or representatives of dying patients will be able to sign these documents.
Starvation is not a humane way to die. To believe it is, is to defend Hitler as being "humane" when he "allowed" people in concentration camps to die of starvation.
Dying people or hurting people under any health-care system are as helpless and powerless as those who were forced into concentration camps.
They are often not able to make rational or willing decisions. They rely on the legal system to protect their rights.
Pain killers administered to starving patients cannot make this horrific way to die acceptable. Pain killers may disallow those watching and waiting to see the pain being suffered by the patient, it does not make it moral or painless.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
End of Life "options" provided in:
HR 3200 IH
1 ・・(iv) may incorporate any advance directive (as
2 defined in section 1866(f)(3)) if executed by the individual. 3
4 ・・(B) The level of treatment indicated under subpara5
graph (A)(ii) may range from an indication for full treat6
ment to an indication to limit some or all or specified
7 interventions. Such indicated levels of treatment may in8
clude indications respecting, among other items・
9 ・・(i) the intensity of medical intervention if the
10 patient is pulse less, apneic, or has serious cardiac
11 or pulmonary problems;
12 ・・(ii) the individual・s desire regarding transfer
13 to a hospital or remaining at the current care setting;14
15 ・(iii) the use of antibiotics; and
16 ・・(iv) the use of artificially administered nutrition and hydration.
---
The refusal to provide and maintain water/liquid or food to a patient is not humane. It serves only to get around the laws against euthanasia.
For this portion of the end-of-life directive to take effect, it provides legal protection to any medical provider to NOT give food and water (liquid) under this bill to this patient.
This bill protects those who choose to kill a person by starving them to death
Starving someone to death is inhumane and immoral.
No patient should ever be starved to death in the United States.
Providing aid and comfort to the sick and dying is what medical care is all about (right up to death by the disease).
To stop nourishment to a dying or "terminally" ill person is to starve that person to death (there is no way to deny this is the aim of this portion of the bill)
This is euthanasia by starvation. It is a deceitful and ugly way to get around the laws against euthanasia.
This legal directive has the potential to support murder in the name of "health care" - (It will open the door for the terminally designated to be starved to death to obtain their organs, to obtain inheritances, to get rid of the patient because someone wants that patient out of the way more quickly).
This end-of-life designation of "care" has nothing to do with "health care"....
People who are very sick will sign anything placed in front of them. Often those who feel they don't have long to live will sign any document because they feel guilty for being a "burden" to those they love.
The legal right to starve a person to death or ask any patient to sign such a request should be removed from this bill.
Posted by: Ash | September 17, 2009 at 07:41 PM