He and his parents await the Judge’s decision regarding the possibility of withdrawing the life support who keep him alive and the possibility of receiving an experimental treatment in the United States. Dr. Hirano, the Rome doctor and Miss Yates [...]
We present these videos and selected ideas, wich give a short clear bioethics review of Charlie Gards’s case. Our Observatory fully agrees with his conclusions. Julian Savulescu (Uehiro Chair in Practical Ethics, Oxford), argues that Charlie Gard, who suffers from an extremely [...]
“All patients, including children, should have access to palliative care units” We believe it interesting to refer to an article published in JAMA (311, 1963-1964) last May, which discussed various aspects of paediatric euthanasia en Belgium. On 13 February 2014, [...]
The Belgian Commission for Euthanasia Control and Evaluation reported on 2016 that 2,025 citizens had died by euthanasia in 2016 — an average of 5.5 every day. This is a record number since its legalisation, although it exceeded the 2015 [...]
Last September, news spread that euthanasia had been applied to a minor in Belgium for the first time. In 2014, Belgium became the second country — after the Netherlands — to decriminalise this practice for minors (pediatric euthanasia), and the [...]
The ethical and legal aspects of euthanasia and assisted suicide continue to be the subject of active controversy. Some countries have recently legalised these practices, while others are in the process of doing so. It therefore seems of interest to [...]
In a recent survey carried out among the members of the American Medical Association, it was found that only 15% of those surveyed were in favour of active euthanasia (use of drugs to bring about death of the patient); in [...]
Advance directives have raised these long-standing issues again, such as withholding or withdrawing nutrition and hydration in terminally ill patients. This matter has been the object of lawsuits, debates and analysis, such as the one published by the Hastings Center [...]
A recent survey about physicians’ bioethics position held by doctors in particualr cases (Medscape Ethics Report 2014, Part 1: Life, Death, and Pain. December 16, 2014.) features the opinions of American and European physicians on the ethical criteria that should [...]
Sedation can be defined as the pharmacological induction of a state of impaired consciousness in which the patient is not fully unconscious, and can be aroused verbally or by applying a mild painful stimulus. In both the United States and [...]
A recent survey carried out in 47 European countries (Int J Public Health, DOI: 10. 1007/s00038-013-0461-6) found that euthanasia is legalized in only six countries: Belgium, Holland, Luxemburg, France, Denmark and Switzerland; its social acceptance is very low in the remaining.
