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She's almost 18 so she should have the final decision. It's her body!
But she isn't 18 and 18 is the age required to make these decisions.
"Almost" only counts in games horseshoes and checkers.
I do have one question: If the patient doesn't want to cooperate receiving this treatment does giving the treatment present insurmountable difficulties for the practitioners giving it?
The girl is seventeen which renders her short of her legal majority. Under the law, a minor does not have the right to determine what medical treatment they receive. Seventeen is close, but is not eighteen years of age when she could make this decision on her own.
Minors are not allowed to decide to if they can go to school or not. They are not allowed to vote, to drink, or to smoke. The system operates on the assumption they are incompetent to make the most important decisions on their own and requires these decisions be made in accordance with a legal framework. I submit that this life and death decision is too critical to be left to someone who has not reached their majority.
The article states that she has Hodgkins Lymphoma and that with the treatment she has an 85% chance of survival. Without the treatment, she is virtually certain to die. If the cure rate were not so high, you might persuade me that this decision should not be forced. Eighty-five percent chance of a cure though tells me that this should not be option.
I don't believe in alternative medical treatments. In fact, I even object to the use of the word "treatment" when they are described. Unless a certain course of therapy can be shown to be effective it does not deserve and should not receive the label "treatment". I believe that people should receive those medical treatments which have been scientifically proven to work.
A real tip off for me was the comment about not wanting all that "poison" in her. It sounds she and her mother have been lied to and perhaps brainwashed by practitioners of alternative medicine.
You neglect to mention that the law does grant the parents the right to make medical decisions for their minor children. While I disagree with their decision I strongly believe in this case it's a decision that is theirs to make. It's not an issue that is cut and dried though. For example, a child of a JW that needs a simple blood transfusion to save their life. When the parents refuse, the state has an obligation to make said minor a ward of the state and give the treatment.
In an interview on the news, her mom said she had no influence on her daughter's decision. She wanted to make that very clear. Alternative treatments had not been looked into. People are going to make assumptions about this but if the mom is to be believed, at this point it is not true.
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The mother is an idiot. The daughter is not sick right now and both of them are denying there is a problem. It is the mother's responsibility to get treatment for her child. She cannot abdicate that and say it is the daughter's decision.
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Originally Posted by prospectheightsresident
Sure, I think she should have that right, though the CT supreme court clearly held otherwise. If she can terminate life growing inside of her without parental or government consent at that age, why should she need government consent to refuse to undergo chemotherapy? Now, knowing what I know about chemo and this case in particular, I'd certainly take the chemo, but that's me. On a more fundamental note, what will likely change, in terms of maturity, etc., in the 4-month span that it will take for this young woman to turn 18?
There is a good chance the treatment will be completed before she is 18 if she does not manage to run away again.
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Originally Posted by BunnyBinkies
Sounds to me like she's seen people who have had chemo. And has seen for herself how it can ruin a person's quality of life. Some people prefer quality to quantity. The medical industry shouldn't be allowed to make that decision for her.
I experienced three years watching my son, diagnosed when he was 13, have chemo for leukemia. It was heart breaking, with many hospitalizations, spinal taps, bone marrow tests, and countless needle sticks, but twenty six years later he is alive and well. The treatment Cassandra faces is much less rigorous than what my son went through.
Her chances of being alive and well twenty six years from now are excellent if she is treated, and I suspect that one's quality of life while dying from Hodgkin's lymphoma is not great.
The "medical industry" is not making the decision for her. The court is.
By the way folks, side effects from chemo can be treated.
In an interview on the news, her mom said she had no influence on her daughter's decision. She wanted to make that very clear. Alternative treatments had not been looked into. People are going to make assumptions about this but if the mom is to be believed, at this point it is not true.
I think the mom was telling the truth. She said all she wanted was her daughter's rights be granted as a human being to chose not to have something done to her. She didn't bring up the topic of alternative medicine. She was asked by a reporter and she responded by saying they never got that far to be able to look into it because her daughter was taken away from them before they had the opportunity.
And of course you may not believe in alternative medical treatments but that covers a wide range. I am not going to get into a discussion as to what is and what isn't alternative but one must ask, "Alternative to what?" There are many so-called "alternative medical" treatments that work very well and many traditional treatments with which we are familiar that do not. I saw the latter all the time on my job. But that is not up for debate here. A person's human rights are.
If she doesn't get this treatment she may not be a human who's rights need to be debated much longer. To use a legal term the whole question may quickly become "moot" when she passes away. I am not oblivious to the question of freedom and liberty here. However, one thing that does occur to me is when the Founding Fathers wrote the Fourteenth Amendment which guarantees us the right to not be deprived of "life, liberty, or property" without due process of law they may have chosen that specific order of words for a reason. A person's property rights are important. A person's right to liberty is extremely important. However, a person's right to life is most important of all. I think that is why they mentioned "life" first before the other two things.
With an 85% chance of a cure this lady would be best off "biting the bullet" and getting her treatment over with.
Quote:
Originally Posted by prospectheightsresident
Sure, I think she should have that right, though the CT supreme court clearly held otherwise. If she can terminate life growing inside of her without parental or government consent at that age, why should she need government consent to refuse to undergo chemotherapy? Now, knowing what I know about chemo and this case in particular, I'd certainly take the chemo, but that's me. On a more fundamental note, what will likely change, in terms of maturity, etc., in the 4-month span that it will take for this young woman to turn 18?
Some people will use any excuse to inject abortion into a debate...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lucky Lady123
She's almost 18 so she should have the final decision. It's her body!
She is almost 18 and legally she must be eighteen to make this decision for herself. "Almost" only counts in games like horseshoes and checkers. Age is absolute requirement under our system for voting, drinking, driving, smoking, and making your own medical decisions. This is undoubtedly the most critical decision this girl/woman will ever make.
I experienced three years watching my son, diagnosed when he was 13, have chemo for leukemia. It was heart breaking, with many hospitalizations, spinal taps, bone marrow tests, and countless needle sticks, but twenty six years later he is alive and well. The treatment Cassandra faces is much less rigorous than what my son went through.
Her chances of being alive and well twenty six years from now are excellent if she is treated, and I suspect that one's quality of life while dying from Hodgkin's lymphoma is not great.
The "medical industry" is not making the decision for her. The court is.
By the way folks, side effects from chemo can be treated.
Watching someone go through it is a whole lot less painful than going through it. Especially being FORCED to go through it against your will.
Whether it's the medical industry or the courts forcing this on her, it's wrong. It should be no one's decision but hers.
I would have thought the side effects could be treated, but I still read of how horribly people suffered from them.
Do most chemo patients not take these treatments, or is the side effect so powerful that it doesn't do much?
I'm just curious.
I had one friend who was given the nausea meds but they didn't help. Almost everything she ate she puked right back up again. Eventually the chemo rotted her gut so much that she had to have part of her colon removed. It wasn't because the cancer had spread to her colon, it was a side effect of the chemo.
She spent months suffering the side effects of chemo & radiation & ended up dying of cancer anyway.
You neglect to mention that the law does grant the parents the right to make medical decisions for their minor children. While I disagree with their decision I strongly believe in this case it's a decision that is theirs to make. It's not an issue that is cut and dried though. For example, a child of a JW that needs a simple blood transfusion to save their life. When the parents refuse, the state has an obligation to make said minor a ward of the state and give the treatment.
That right ends when they make a decision that would kill or inflict grave harm on their child. At that point, the courts can step in and the judge can appoint a guardian to make the treatment decisions. This kind of thing has been necessitated by nuts who think they should deny their children blood transfusions or a simple course of antibiotics for pneumonia. I don't like it either, but some people just are not fit parents and sometimes otherwise fit parents fail to make reasonable medical treatment choices for their children.
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