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Essay on Right to die (about a cace: Terri Schiavo)
Introduction
THE TERRI SCHIAVO CASE in Florida focused attention on a variety of issues related to the end of life: who is the decision maker, the status of advanced directives, the role of family members with respect to married adult children, and issues related to the removal of life support systems, particularly assisted nutrition and hydration. Terri Schiavo is now linked to two other young women who played a critical role in helping us to think through ethical issues at the end of life. Karen Ann Quinlan and her family raised the issue of the removal of a ventilator. In her case the physicians were reluctant to do this because they feared legal repercussions. The legal and ethical analysis concurred that such removal was justified because it constituted extraordinary means of treatment. Nancy Cruzan and her family focused attention on the removal of artificial nutrition and hydration (ANH). Again law and ethics concurred that such removal was justified, particularly because people testified that being maintained in such circumstances were not her wishes.
On February 25, 1990, Terri Schiavo had suffered a heart attack, possibly brought on as a result of chemical imbalances from an eating disorder. She suffered loss of oxygen to her brain and was eventually diagnosed as being in a persistent vegetative state. A decade later, in February 2000, her husband Michael Schiavo requested that her feeding tube be removed. The Circuit Court judge agreed and this set off a lengthy appeal and counter-appeal process, including attempted legislative initiatives from the state of Florida and the United States Congress and 37 court reviews, that was complicated by increasing family acrimony and public commentary from a variety of sources: religious, political, ethical, and legal. After a five-year legal battle, the feeding tube was removed, and Terri Schiavo died on March 31, 2005, at the age of 41....
