what happens when a countries' Health Care system has crumbled

[donsu]

http://www.buzzflash.com/mailbag/05/09/mai05246.html

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Subject: Putting Katrina Victims "To Sleep"

Some patients in the Katrina disaster area have been put to sleep—and I don't mean the dogs and cats.

I happened to catch an amazing segment on FoxNews. I don't know if they will link the video, but it's not up at the time of writing. Nor is there any mention of the story on their site. The segment was shown at about 5:20 PM EST.

"News reader" Page Hopkins was talking live with a Fox reporter (female). The reporter was in the disaster area, but I didn't catch whether she was in New Orleans or some other area. The reporter was discussing her talks with medical personnel.

According to the reporter, ill patients were triaged into three groups—"will not recover," "may recover," and "should recover." For lack of medical facilities, people in the "will not recover" group were given large doses of morphine. The reporter made clear that these were doses sufficient to put the patients "to sleep" in some cases.

A rather worried-looking Hopkins came back with something like "But these were patients who would have died anyway?" The reporter hesitated and agreed that many of them would have died, leaving unsaid but implied that some patients would not have died. "Heartbreaking" for the medical personnel, she said.

This is absolutely astonishing. A rescue effort under the ultimate command of Mr. Right-to-Life Bush was euthanizing gravely ill patients.

This is the same George Bush who sent former Attorney General Ashcroft to federal court to oppose Oregon's "Death with Dignity" Act, which allows for physician-assisted suicide. (The government lost the case at the district level and on appeal. It will be considered by the Roberts Supreme Court during the coming term.)

This is the same George Bush who flew back from Texas to sign a federal law intervening in the Terri Schiavo case at 1:11 in the morning.

But the actions described on Fox go far beyond physician-assisted suicide or removal of a feeding tube from a brain-dead patient. This was euthanasia; this was mercy-killing. And whether you support the concept in principal or not, the Fox News account made it clear that for the medical personnel involved, these actions were forced by the inadequacy of the medical response to the disaster.

There is a good chance that the media will ignore this story. But the Christian Right, at the very least, should have some questions for Mr. Bush in the morning. Description: If this story catches media attention, at a minimum it could turn into one of the most embarrassing episodes to emerge from the media disaster.

http://www.simplyappalling.blogspot.com/

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america is a crime scene