Shame they are not inclined to do the same to criminals.
Shame they are not inclined to do the same to criminals.
Literally nothing to do with the British state. The boy was always going to die. The doctors sought to spare him from suffering unnecessary and hopeless treatments that have never have had a chance of succeeding. His parents - understandably - didn't want to face that reality and sentimental idiots have helped sustained their sad fantasies. The courts did absolutely everything to ensure that every avenue was explored and that every ethical argument was carefully considered before coming to the right decision.
The tragedy is that people think you can keep a sick child alive simply by force of will. You can't. Sick kids die and all the campaigns and court cases in the world won't change that.
He was on life support..... he is suffering and, understandably, his parents do not want to make the horrible decision to see their son die. The illness he has does not have a cure and it is slowly killing him (who knows if he is feeling pain). It was the correct thing to do imo
I heard that the Doctor in the states hadn't examined the child.
Could someone not have organised for the bloke to pop over and have a quick look? Might have been a bloody start.
With respect, you don't know whether any treatments had a chance of success or not. You are going on the opinion of the british doctors.
Well, the view of another doctor who thinks he can help. Comfortable dead kid vs tiny glimmer of hope? What would you do?
It isn't me sitting here saying the other treatment didn't have a chance of success. Of course, now we will never know.
I cant help but wonder how this squares with your view of the NHS last week. Careful consideration, due process and a dead kid. So quality care and decision making can have a poor health outcome?
I don't think much of the NHS as you know, but this has little to do with last week's stats. The child's health outcome was never going to be anything but bad. His doctors have a duty not to 'strive officiously to keep alive' and are also required to undertake triage based on the likelihood of survival. We entrust them with these decisions because they know a fúck sight better than we do.
The doctor at no point said his treatment would help. He said it had shown some limited signs of success on a purely experimental basis in a related, but significantly different disorder. One can understand why the parents would clutch at such a straw, but equally understand why clinicians and physicians required to make a dispassionate decision weighing the likely benefits against the chances of unnecessary distress to the child would come down against it.
Of course. No issue with doctors following procedure. Its their duty.
The problem is that the parents, quite understandably, were desperate to try anything and don't give a **** about procedure. The key point seems to be who has the right to decide whether to move the kid or not. That is tricky.
But it's not just procedure, it's clinical judgement. Do you really think that if the people caring for him sincerely believed there was any chance of a cure or significant improvement that they'd have blocked him going to the states? Of course not. They would've looked incredibly closely at the treatment and the kid's condition and come to the conclusion that the situation was hopeless and that moving the kid would've caused undue distress. That is a clinical decision that we, as a society, employ them to make on our behalf.
The parents are not qualified to make that judgement based purely on being his parents. Otherwise, we would allow Jehovah's Witnesses to deny their children blood transfusions and other treatments based on their beliefs. We do not allow such things because the Health Service has the ultimate say on child welfare for the simple reason that parents do not always know best.
The parents had found the money for the treatment. The treatment had a possibility of working, however slim. It should not up to the NHS or the state to decide to block this.
And if the parents had decided that exorcism or homeopathic treatments were what was required, would it still be up to them to decide? Of course not. The parents do not know what they're talking about and are motivated by desperation and grief. They cannot make a dispassionate decision.
Actually, yes, unless physical harm is involved. Homeopathic treatment is often give hand in hand with conventional medicine these days and I assume, whatever your religious view, you don't object to praying?
But I imagine you're not suggesting this treatment, being developed by qualified doctors in the US, falls into these categories?
Yes, I understand it is down to clinical judgement. However, when you are talking about an experimental procedure with very little data, what are they basing this clinical judgement on?
We are talking about the difference between acceptance and clutching at straws. If the kid is dying anyway he doesn't have a lot to lose. I would have got the bloke over sharpish (economy).
You are basing this clinical judgment on the fact that it's an experimental procedure with very little data and that what data there is suggests no likely effect on the condition in question. No reputable clinician could possibly justify distress to a dying child based on the existence of a treatment whose data suggests no likely effect better than placebo.
Sure, if the parents had got this doctor over earlier, then great. He could have made whatever recommendations he liked and the NHS staff could have assessed them on their merits and acted according to the child's best interests. However, it is not the role of the NHS to start flying in quacks from around the world to experiment on dying children.
That's pretty rich from someone who suggests homeopathy is in any way a valid form of complementary medicine (as opposed to the horseshīt it demonstrably is) and that the NHS is happy to let save-able kids die just to save them a bit of hassle and a few quid.
Nope. You are suggesting that. All I did was to say, check it for yourself, that the NHS is happy to condone homeopathy when it chooses to.
I stand by the second part of your statement because that is the effect whether it is their intent or not. The kid will die and the NHS will save itself hassle and a few quid.
The money arguement doesn't work, the NHS already refuse some drugs if they see them as being too expensive for the treatment concerned.
Doesn't the poor lad need help liviung at the moment? The treatment that they were originally offering wouldn't cure him it would just let him live longer (if it even works)
The existence of homeopathy anywhere near the NHS is a national disgrace and due almost entirely to that renowned gobshīte the Prince of Wales. I would agree that their readiness to countenance such nonsense does undermine their reputation for making dispassionate judgments based on hard, clinical data. However, that is not the fault of the individuals involved in this decision, most of whom I don't imagine like homeopathy any more than I do.
Intent and effect are two very different things. The intent was to achieve the best possible level of care for this child given his condition. The effect is that the NHS has had to go to court at great public expense to defend its its primacy in such decision-making. The fight was over an important and compassionate principle and was - I would suggest - a lot more hassle and more expensive than letting the poor child be used as a guinea pig.
The outcome is that the boy will die. The boy was always going to die, though.
No compassion was involved. Only an infringement of the ultimate civil liberty, the right to try and save your life by whatever means possible. The intent was to stop the child from having potential life-saving treatment. If this line was taken with every new treatment we'd still be chewing leaves every time we had a headache.
You do not know if the boy would have lived or died with the experimental treatment. You cannot know, neither can I. It might have worked or it might have helped to improve the treatment for others, that is how science works.
A child incapable of expressing an informed preference is in the care of the state, not of anyone else. His parents are not and never were empowered to override the NHS's clinical decision in this matter.
Modern science does not work by chucking early-stage, wholly unproven treatments at desperately sick babies on the vague off-chance they might work. That would be both bad science and monstrously unethical.
Your suggestion that there was no compassion involved in this decision is, I'm afraid, absurd. Compassion was absolutely at the heart of this decision.