The Terri Schiavo thing

[Sgt. Boomer]

1. The hospital where she was first admitted found that Terri did not have a heart attack. There were no cardiac enzymes in her blood, and no abnormalities in her EKG.

She was “admitted into the emergency room with a very, very stiff neck consistent with brand new injury to her neck. Testimony given at a 2002 evidentiary hearing revealed that Terri was presented at the emergency room with an extraordinarily rigid neck described by one physician as consistent with attempted strangulation”.

2. “During 1998, she was evaluated by Dr. James Barnhill, neurologist, who testified that he examined her for ten minutes and determined that she had no chance for recovery, and was in a persistent vegetative state. He obtained no blood pressure nor did anyone else, apparently, on the day of his exam. No tests including Urinary Tract infection evaluations, blood tests, EEGs, evoked potentials, or new CT/MRI exams were ordered.”

3. In May 2002, neurologist and 1999 Nobel Prize nominee William Hammesfahr, M.D, examined Terri Schiavo for 5 hours and concluded (among) the following:

The patient is not in coma.
She is alert and responsive to her environment.
She tries to please others by doing activities for which she gets verbal praise.
She responds to music.
She differentiates sounds from voices.
She attempts to verbalize.
She has voluntary control over multiple extremities
She can swallow.
She can feel pain.

He also stated: “Interestingly, I have seen this pattern of mixed brain (cerebral) and spinal cord findings in a patient once before, a patient who was asphyxiated.”

4. Michael Schiavo:

“lives adulterously with Jodi Centozone, with whom he has had two children.”

“After wining control of Terri\'s treatment, plus medical malpractice and other legal awards totaling some $1.6 million, Michael had Terri\'s cats, Shanna and Tolly, put to sleep.” (What kind of inhuman #%$%! kills cats. Oh, I guess the same kind of #%$%! That would kill a disabled person).

“Terri\'s family complains that Michael has denied Terri speech-, occupational- and other therapies that could strengthen her mind.”

“According to the September 2003 deposition of Terri\'s nurse, Carla Iyer, Michael asked, \"Can\'t you do anything to accelerate her death?\" and \"When is that bitch gonna die?\" When Terri\'s health waned, Iyer said he would exclaim, \"I\'m going to be rich!\" then discuss plans to buy a car, boat, and European vacation.”

Sources: 1, 2, 3

And if you really believe he’s going to give that money to charity, well then… (I’ll edit in an end to that sentence when I’ve thought of something relatively witty and not too insulting --- in the meantime ).

This isn’t about Terri’s “right” to die. She’s in no position to make her wishes known, and Michael Schiavo is hardly credible.

It’s about whether the courts can extend the frontiers of euthanasia.

Incidentally, the Nazis’ first experiments in “euthanasia” began in 1938, when a German man wrote to Hitler asking that his severely disabled child be granted a “mercy death”. The case, “so moved Hitler that he ordered his personal physician to establish if the claims were true, and if so, that the child be granted euthanasia” (imagine Hitler being moved- almost brings a lump to one’s throat… oh wait, that’s vomit).