Scene: A Hospital in Canada, eh?
Doctor: So I was thinkin’ eh? Your husband, he don’t look so good eh?
Wife: But Doctor, he just needs help! You can treat him. Anyway, I am his wife and I authorize the treatment.
Doctor: Oh, so sorry, eh? Actually, not your call. I think he is a goner, so we’re gonna stop feedin’ him eh.
Wife: You can’t do that! I am sure if we just take take care of him, he will recover!
Doctor: I suppose you’re a smart fellow, eh? You went to thirteen years of medical school didja? Like I said, I think he is a goner so that is the end of it.
Wife: How can you do this? I am his wife? How can you just decide if someone lives or dies? You can’t do this to him! You can’t do this to me!
Doctor: Let this cup pass from you, eh? Right. Not gonna happen eh? My will not yours. Here at Grace hospital, you have no say. Policy dictates that I have the final say. So…It might be time to say goodbye to your husband, you know, like say take off you hoser! Or something similar, eh?
Wife: You and this hospital are monsters!
This little play brought to you courtesy of the Manitoba College of Physicians and Surgeons. They just issued guidelines to their doctors that says that doctors have the right – not patients or their families – to decide when life-sustaining treatment can be withdrawn. From Lifesite:
The ultimate decision, says Dr. Bill Pope, registrar of the College, lies with the physician, and there is no need to heed the wishes of patients or families. Doctors must “communicate” the decision with patients or their legal proxy “to make that situation more transparent,” Pope said. “Nonetheless, doctors are permitted to make that decision.”
That sucks, eh?
February 1, 2008 at 4:42 am
And the doctor quoted in the story is named Pope? Can you say “cruel irony”?
February 1, 2008 at 4:47 am
And all this is taking place at Grace Hospital? Can you say “more cruel irony”?
February 1, 2008 at 9:37 am
That’s really weird. Don’t they have patient consent laws?
February 1, 2008 at 2:00 pm
Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.
Where are the Catholic heroes for life in Canada?
Bob Hunt
February 1, 2008 at 2:45 pm
This is the foregone conclusion of “socialized medicine/universal healthcare”. The individual is sacrificed so that the “collective” may remain healthy.
There is a strong push here and in the U.K. for the same type of authority to be given to physicians. If we rest for only a moment, this will happen here too. Canada is very sick morally.
February 1, 2008 at 3:15 pm
I agree with everything Pat wrote here. But can’t somebody mock him for the lame Canadian accent?
February 2, 2008 at 2:40 am
Actually, this is already happening here. Most hospitals have a policy against “futile care” which is whatever they and their “ethics committees” say it is. The Terri Schindler-Schiavo Foundation has quite a pile of stories of this little play (minus the accent, of course) taking place here.