JAMA. Published online April 9, 2018. doi:10.1001/jama.2018.3441
Clearly distinguishing between the living and the dead is an essential function in any society, necessary for determining when people may be buried, when their wills may be executed, when efforts to keep them alive may be terminated, and when they may donate their organs, among other issues. The recent and ongoing case of Jahi McMath has raised some doubts about how this distinction is made in the United States.1-3
Jahi McMath is currently a 17-year-old girl who experienced a massive hemorrhage after a complex tonsillectomy in 2013, leaving her brain-dead. Her family refused to accept the diagnosis and she was transferred to New Jersey, which by law prohibits physicians from declaring death by neurologic criteria when this would violate the religious beliefs of the patient. Now, more than 4 years after she was issued a death certificate in California, she is being kept biologically alive in an apartment in New Jersey, supported by a ventilator, tube feedings, and supplemental hormones. She has continued to grow and develop, even progressing through puberty. Her case has led many to wonder: How is it that society can consider a growing adolescent, albeit one with a devastating brain injury who needs a ventilator to breathe, to be “dead” in any commonsense meaning of the term?/.../
No comments:
Post a Comment