With the case of the 13-year-old boy stricken with Hodgkin's lymphoma who has been court-ordered to undergo more chemo therapy in the news, I wondered where people draw the line over which lives are worth saving and which ones are disposable or without value.
According to polls, just under half of all Americans believe that an unborn child's life is not worth protecting if the mother doesn't want to deal with the inconvenience of a pregnancy, and the Terri Schiavo case taught us that a life is not worth preserving if a husband decides it's time to pull the plug. There are also some who say that the "civil rights" of accused terrorists are of a higher value than thousands of innocent lives.
So, why are doctors being ordered to give chemo treatments to Daniel Hauser, who has stated that he will scream, bite, punch, and kick, anyone who tries to force a needle into him? The Hausers are Roman Catholics who subscribe to a "do no harm" philosophy and quit chemo for what is considered a highly treatable cancer after one treatment. Daniel's father, Anthony Hauser, said: "I know many people around here who have had cancer, they did the chemo, it would come back. They did the chemo again and again and they are all in the grave. Chemo isn't foolproof."
I'm not sure where I stand on this issue. Sure, there are plenty of incompetent parents who have no business withholding medical treatment for their sick kids. Then again, where do you draw the line? Shouldn't all (competent) parents be able to make medical decisions for their children? Shouldn't non-minor patients be able to make those decisions for themselves? Is it ever a good idea to allow the government a say in what your medical treatment should be? Who gets to decide what is the best treatment is anyway?
I just think it's so ironic that we have all of these laws allowing us to kill one another and our babies, but then we force people to undergo what we consider to be the only logical and life-saving treatments when they're sick.
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