Argentina narrowly rejects abortion bill
by Xavier Symons | 11 Aug 2018 |
Argentina’s upper house this week narrowly rejected a bill that would have legalised abortion up to 14 weeks. The 38 to 31 vote means that the country will retain its tight restrictions on abortion. Currently, abortion is only permitted in cases of rape, when the mother is mentally disabled or if there is serious risk to her health.
An estimated two million protesters gathered outside of of Congress in Buenos Aires as politicians debated the proposal on Wednesday and Thursday, and groups of protesters clashed with police following the announcement of the result.
The country’s president Mauricio Mauri voted against the bill, but he allowed his party a conscience vote on the matter and said that he would sign the motion into law should it pass the senate.
Analysts attribute the failure of the bill primarily to opposition from senators from conservative northern provinces. Senator Mario Fiad from the northwestern Jujuy province described abortion a “tragedy”, warning, “the right to life is about to become the weakest of rights”. The Catholic Church and smaller evangelical churches also strongly opposed the bill.
Saturday, August 11, 2018
Every year, about 1.5 million cases of euthanasia take place in the United States. Does this have a negative impact on healthcare workers? Sorry, about 1.5 million cases of cat and dog euthanasia take place. But the question is still relevant. Veterinarians, veterinary assistants and shelter workers experience great stress at having to put animals down.
The emotional connection between the work of human doctors and animal doctors is closer than you might think. Owners often react to a pet’s death with the intensity of grief which appears equivalent to the loss of a beloved relative.
So the moral stress which vets experience is relevant. Suicide amongst vets has been the topic of several studies. “Veterinarians are four times more likely than members of the general population and two times more likely than other health professionals to die by suicide,” according to a 2012 study in the journal of The American Association of Suicidology, Suicide and Life-Threatening Behaviour.
Why? Performing euthanasia day in, day out, also appears to make some vets less able to resist the temptation to commit suicide. The authors of the 2012 study found that “... all else being equal, veterinarians may be more likely than members of other professions to enact a lethal attempt when they desire suicide because their exposure to euthanasia has rendered them less fearful of death."
Aren’t there lessons in these finding which are relevant to doctors who euthanize their patients? Sometimes doctors in Belgium or the Netherlands are quoted as saying that the death they helped was beautiful or peaceful. Could that be bravado masking their own nonchalance about human death?
How many times have we all heard the argument, “You wouldn’t let a dog suffer like this...” Its logic is that if the suffering of animals and humans is essentially the same, they both should be released from suffering in the same way. But if the animal-human parallel works for the patient, why not for the doctor? If we allow euthanasia, surely we can expect the same burn-out rates and the same suicide rates as veterinarians ... at least the same. That should scare us all – especially the doctors who will be responsible.
The emotional connection between the work of human doctors and animal doctors is closer than you might think. Owners often react to a pet’s death with the intensity of grief which appears equivalent to the loss of a beloved relative.
So the moral stress which vets experience is relevant. Suicide amongst vets has been the topic of several studies. “Veterinarians are four times more likely than members of the general population and two times more likely than other health professionals to die by suicide,” according to a 2012 study in the journal of The American Association of Suicidology, Suicide and Life-Threatening Behaviour.
Why? Performing euthanasia day in, day out, also appears to make some vets less able to resist the temptation to commit suicide. The authors of the 2012 study found that “... all else being equal, veterinarians may be more likely than members of other professions to enact a lethal attempt when they desire suicide because their exposure to euthanasia has rendered them less fearful of death."
Aren’t there lessons in these finding which are relevant to doctors who euthanize their patients? Sometimes doctors in Belgium or the Netherlands are quoted as saying that the death they helped was beautiful or peaceful. Could that be bravado masking their own nonchalance about human death?
How many times have we all heard the argument, “You wouldn’t let a dog suffer like this...” Its logic is that if the suffering of animals and humans is essentially the same, they both should be released from suffering in the same way. But if the animal-human parallel works for the patient, why not for the doctor? If we allow euthanasia, surely we can expect the same burn-out rates and the same suicide rates as veterinarians ... at least the same. That should scare us all – especially the doctors who will be responsible.
 Michael Cook Editor BioEdge |  |  |  |
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The vote means the country will retain its tight restrictions on abortion. BioEdge
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