Three years ago, the Dutch parliament made it legal for doctors to inject a sedative and a lethal dose of muscle relaxant at the request of adult patients suffering great pain with no hope of relief.

The Groningen Protocol, as the hospital's guidelines have come to be known, would create a legal framework for permitting doctors to actively end the life of newborns deemed to be in similar pain from incurable disease or extreme deformities.

The guideline says euthanasia is acceptable when the child's medical team and independent doctors agree the pain cannot be eased and there is no prospect for improvement, and when parents think it's best.

Examples include extremely premature births, where children suffer brain damage from bleeding and convulsions; and diseases where a child could only survive on life support for the rest of its life, such as severe cases of spina bifida and epidermosis bullosa, a rare blistering illness.

The has hospital revealed it carried out four such mercy killings in 2003, and reported all cases to government prosecutors. There have been no legal proceedings against the hospital or the doctors.

Roman Catholic organizations and the Vatican (news - web sites) have reacted with outrage to the announcement, and U.S. euthanasia opponents contend the proposal shows the Dutch have lost their moral compass.

"The slippery slope in the Netherlands has descended already into a vertical cliff," said Wesley J. Smith, a prominent California-based critic, in an e-mail to The Associated Press.

Child euthanasia remains illegal everywhere. Experts say doctors outside Holland do not report cases for fear of prosecution.

"As things are, people are doing this secretly and that's wrong," said Eduard Verhagen, head of Groningen's children's clinic. "In the Netherlands we want to expose everything, to let everything be subjected to vetting."

According to the Justice Ministry, four cases of child euthanasia were reported to prosecutors in 2003. Two were reported in 2002, seven in 2001 and five in 2000. All the cases in 2003 were reported by Groningen, but some of the cases in other years were from other hospitals.

Groningen estimated the protocol would be applicable in about 10 cases per year in the Netherlands, a country of 16 million people.

Since the introduction of the Dutch law, Belgium has also legalized euthanasia, while in France, legislation to allow doctor-assisted suicide is currently under debate. In the United States, the state of Oregon is alone in allowing physician-assisted suicide, but this is under constant legal challenge.

However, experts acknowledge that doctors euthanize routinely in the United States and elsewhere, but that the practice is hidden.


Link Here

What do we think?

I don't see anything wrong with it. Obviously it should be reserved for the absolute most extreme situations (and it seems like that's what they're doing), but I don't see anything wrong with it as long as the parents of the child are involved in the decision making with the doctors.

On a second note, i've always found it rather funny/interesting that those who believe in an afterlife are the ones against things like euthanasia and abortion. If there is a heaven, and the child is going there because it's free of sin, what's the big deal?

A few comments:

-The slippery slope argument is terrible; I have yet to see a convincing argument along those lines. Think of the idea of gay marriage leading to marriage between humans and cows, etc .


-It seems one of the arguments proposed in the article is: since they will die anyways, why not reduce the pain, etc.? Well, you might as well argue that, if they do not live for a long time (the article says the life span can be only a few days or less), why not let them live a little longer? It seems the argument can be extended both ways

-Another argument layed out seems to be: the doctors are already doing it, so why not let it out in the open? Reminds me a little of prostitution, and how legalizing it would lead to greater safety for the whores, etc. Thing is though, the gov't by allowing for this to happen, publicly advocating it under certain circumstances, seems as if they are supporting it.

Not all of those who believe in an afterlife are opposed, and not all of those who do not believe in an afterlife are in support of it.

These two things have absolutely nothing to do with each other; the problem is specifically grounded in this life, not outside it.

Doctors in U.S. only practice passive euthanasia, not active euthanasia, which is what was legalized in the Netherlands.

Whether there is a moral difference is up to you, but the article is wrong in saying that doctors in U.S. use that practice.

My personal opinion is that this is very wrong. Doctors can be wrong about these cases; are we willing to take the chance and kill a baby that has a fighting chance?

Do you honestly know (or have ever heard of) a single staunch Catholic or Christian that believes in a women's right to chose, or is okay with euthanasia?

It doesn't really specify what kind of euthanasia is meant, but I think the article was referring to passive euthanasia, that the doctors practice euthanasia by means of withdrawing medical treatment delibrately. The doctors obviously wouldn't be able to perform active euthanasia.

It's kind of tough to be wrong about something like extreme spina bifida, Krem. It's not like they're killing these kids because they have a cold.

From the reports I read before, what was legalized in Netherlands is actually active euthanasia.

This is wrong. A newborn cannot consent to killing itself, an adult can.

Doctors in the U.S. give the parents a choice whether or not to remove the baby from life support if the baby was born before 25 weeks. (If the baby is removed from life support that's passive euthanasia)

About 20% (I believe that's the number) of those baby survive without trauma and become normal adults, if given proper care in the beginning.

What do you mean by passive euthanasia? Doctors cannot assist in a suicde on the orders of a third party (parents) (Cruzon v. Missouri)

Let's not get this confused with abortion though.

I don't agree with this, perhaps If i researched it more....but....

Doctors can withdraw a baby off of life support if they believe there's no chance it will survive.

Thats a litte different though

Like I said, it's up to you to make a moral distinction.

20%? A lot of parents would not feel comfortable with those odds, which is really all this comes down to anyway. Do you want to give the parents the right to do this, or not?

Also, it is the doctors job to inform the parents that there is a chance their child will grow and have a normal life. I think that when most parents hear this, they would chose to let the baby fight.

What I mean is life support and injecting something that will kill a newborn....is different, don't you think?

20%!?!?!!? I think thats pretty good odds when dealing with life and most parents would probably not consent to the euthaniasia with those odds.

I'm not sure about the numbers (I may be confusing it with something else). But even if it's 1%, I don't believe the parents should be playing god.

Mistakes in this area do happen.

That's beside the point. You're mixing two completely different things here. Discussion of euthanasia has nothing to do with the afterlife; there being an afterlife does not make any difference to the issue.

Euthanasia, and the moral issues involved here, are grounded in this life; the key question is whether it is right to take someone's life, under any circumstances, for whatever reason.

And besides, you could twist the argument either way: if there is no afterlife, then this life is more urgent, if you will, since there is nothing else to fall back on. So, we do want to take away a human being's one chance at life? Etc. Similarly, if there is an afterlife, for those who believe it, that is evident of a higher being, which would only support their moral stance. So, they wuld be even more compelled to argue against euthanasia.

But as I said, the afterlife and euthanasia are two completely different things.


Back on topic,

aside from the slippery slope argument which I loathe, there is one which I think it grounded on firmer footing:

How do we know the doctors are making the right decision? At the end of it, it really comes down (sometimes) to people making subjective decisions, to the best of their abilities. Well, what if some scientific breakthrough proves that those babies could have been saved? Or, what if the diagnosis is wrong, and the child did have a fighting chance?

Life support(pulling the plug is a bit different)
In the case above,, the newborn dosen't even have a chance to live

Is it, really? Either case, you're in effect killing a person.

Ya, I think so too. I was referring to the article's comments regarding euthanasia in the US, that they meant passive euthanasia, and not active euthanasia.