Upset Because Your Baby Lived?
Posted by Arwen Mosher in News on Tuesday, March 17, 2009 5:40 PM
Sometimes I read news stories that make me want to hold my babies close and never let go of them.
And sometimes I read news stories that make me want to hold other people’s babies close and never let them go.
This is one such story.
A couple in Quebec, parents of an 16-month-old girl who survived her infancy despite being very sick after she was born, is suing the hospital where she was treated… because the hospital failed to starve her to death.
Doctors had given a dire prognosis for newborn Phebe Mantha and her parents agreed that she should be removed from both respiratory support and nutrition. But after it was discovered that she could breathe on her own, a hospital ethics committee recommended continuing to feed the baby.
She lived, and the couple was able to bring her home a few months later. She does have some disabilities, but nothing like what the doctors initially predicted she would have.
I was struck by this quote from their lawyer:
“The parents said it was the worst decision they ever had to make but they could not see what kind of life Phebe would have. They believed if their child could somehow consent, she would have agreed to have her life end.”
Ironically, since Phebe is neither deaf nor blind as doctors predicted she’d be, her quality of life is significantly better than expected. Her parents’ life, on the other hand, is made difficult by her existence, and that is apparently the reason they are suing.
The parents say that Phebe’s mother has had to quit her job to take care of their daughter and they are now living on only one income.
“I would tell them to come to our house for a week and see what it’s like to live with a child like ours,” said Mantha. “See the involvement that’s needed—the time and energy in terms of everything involved in our life.”
It sounds like the little girl’s parents really believe they would be better off without her. As a parent of two little ones myself, I’d really like to believe that’s not true, and news stories can be misleading. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they’re suing because they see it as the best way to get financial assistance for the undeniably expensive task of raising a child with disabilities.
What’s most horrifying to me about this whole story is the idea that parents should have the right to starve their children to death if they’re in bad medical condition after birth. There’s nothing in the news coverage that indicates that it would have been illegal for Phebe Mantha’s parents to let go without nutrition even though she needed no heroic interventions to survive. The couple themselves clearly believe it was an ethical choice, and doubtless there are plenty of people who agree with them.
And where does this lead? We have the “right” to kill our children until the hour they’re born, the right to let them be starved once born if they’re disabled. It’s not yet legal to withhold food from a healthy infant but it seems it’s only a matter of time until we get there. The Culture of Death marches on.
Lord, have mercy on us!
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