GESTIÓN EN SALUD PÚBLICA: BioEdge: Vatican-backed hospital proposes charter of rights for incurable children

domingo, 3 de junio de 2018

BioEdge: Vatican-backed hospital proposes charter of rights for incurable children

BioEdge: Vatican-backed hospital proposes charter of rights for incurable children

Bioedge

Vatican-backed hospital proposes charter of rights for incurable children

by Michael Cook | 2 Jun 2018 |

The cases of Alfie Evans and Charlie Gard rang bells around the world, not just in England. From Italy comes a proposal (PDF in Italian), a Charter of Rights for Incurable Children, which will be promoted in the European Parliament and hospitals around the world. The sponsor is Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, in Rome, which is linked to the Vatican.

The ten articles of the document are:

The child and his family are entitled to the best possible relationship with doctors and health personnel
The child and his family have the right to health education
The child and his family have the right to obtain a second opinion
The child and his family have the right to receive the most competent diagnosis
The child has the right to access the best experimental treatment
The child is entitled to cross-border health transfers
The child has the right to continuity of care and palliative care
The child has the right to respect his person even in the final phase of life, without therapeutic obstinacy
The child and his family have a right to psychological and spiritual accompaniment.
The child and his family have the right to participate in care, research and reception activities

Saturday, June 2, 2018

Some years ago, I received an unexpected phone call from a Melbourne magazine which described itself as the voice of the Australian Left. One of the editors wanted me to write an article about euthanasia activist Philip Nitschke. “He’s ****ing the proletariat over, comrade,” was his interpretation of Dr Nitschke’s mission. I obliged and was later rewarded with an invitation to the magazine’s Christmas party. I had an interesting chat there with an enthusiastic fan of Stalin’s philosophical works (“much misunderstood”), thus dispelling any misgivings I might have had about the magazine’s left-wing credentials.

Nowadays, “left-wing” almost certainly indicates support for euthanasia. That’s why I was gratified to read that the defeat of a euthanasia bill in Portugal last week was due to the opposition of the Communist Party. Its leader, João Oliveira, told the Portuguese parliament that:

“Faced with the problems of human suffering, illness, disability or incapacity, the solution is not to remove responsibility from society by promoting the early death of people in these circumstances, but to promote social progress in order to ensure conditions for a decent life.”

That’s what I thought left-wing politics was all about: protecting the disadvantaged. Have left-wingers in the Anglosphere lost their way?