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In England, it’s called the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP). Here it is better known as the “death panel,” but the end result is the same. When you become so sick that the cost of your care is deemed burdensome to the state, you are consigned to the proverbial ice floe and set adrift.
Shocking new figures released on Tuesday reveals that the situation in Britain is more grave (no pun intended) than anyone thought. The MailOnline reports that as many as 60,000 patients are placed on the LCP each year, a virtual death sentence, without giving their consent. A third of families, moreover, are kept in the dark when doctors withdraw lifesaving treatment from loved ones.
And it gets worse than that: Some patients are denied nutrition and fluids, both measures designed to hasten their deaths, which typically occur within 29 hours.
Elspeth Chowdharay-Best of Alert, an anti-euthanasia group, is quoted as saying, “The Pathway is designed to finish people off double quick. It is a lethal pathway.”
Yet, not everyone shares that grim assessment. National Health Service Secretary Jeremy Hunt has claimed that the LCP is a “fantastic step forward,” adding that “we need to be unabashed about that because it’s basically designed to bring hospice-style care to terminally-ill people in hospitals.”
The 60,000 figure was arrived at through a joint audit of in-patient and death records from 178 hospitals by the Marie Curie Palliative Care Institute in Liverpool and the Royal College of Physicians. The audit showed that an estimated 130,000 patients are put on the pathway each year. Thousands are condemned to die in pain because nurses do not do enough to keep them comfortable while drugs are administered.
Concerns have been raised that clinical judgments are being skewed by incentives for hospitals to use the pathway. MailOnline reports that health trusts are thought to have been rewarded to the tune of £30 million ($49 million) for putting additional patients on the LCP.
Critics note that it is a self-fulfilling prophecy because there is no scientific method of predicting when death will come. But Secretary Hunt told LBC Radio that a few wrongful deaths shouldn’t be construed as an indictment on the system:
I would be very sad if as a result of something that is a big step forward going wrong in one or two cases we discredited the concept that we need to do a lot better to give people dignity in their final hours because it’s something we haven’t done well.
Lots of people don’t want to die with lots of tubes going in and out of their body — they actually want to die in a dignified way.
Hunt didn’t elaborate on how much dignity patients experience when their suffering goes untreated or they are denied food and water. Related Articles
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So physician-assisted suicide policies result in physician-directed homicides?
Surprise, surprise.
I really feel bad for the Europeans and their having to deal with a health care systems that utilizes “death panels,” or whatever you want to call that process. It’s a good thing we live in the USA where something like that could never happen. Oh, wait!
Steven
Steven
Hey, don’t joke. I’ve had a cold a couple weeks. At the rate I’m going through Kleenex, I expect the ObamaCare cops to show up at my door any day now.
They might just come and put you in a hospital room with some other folks who have become ill, like Hillary, who they also want to put on the “cost effective” medical treatment path. You know, over in the hospital’s Vincent Foster wing. (Oh, the irony of being in that wing with Hill!) Just you and Hill…and Bill. Bill will have one eye on the heart monitor and a finger on his speed dial. Poor Bill hasn’t had a good “Kathy Griffin” in what, 15 years or so. Don’t get in the way of this, Howard. Ever see what happens when a stallion gets a scent of the neighbors mare?
Steven
Steven
The Vincent Foster Memorial wing was actually paid for with taxpayer money during the Clinton years. Why else do you think he raised the top tier tax rate to 39.6%?
FIFY
Didn’t I just do another story about that? The mare tried to kick out the window of the police, if I remember correctly.
ok ok ok…I can only tolerate so much…Vince Foster was never mentioned here until last week (me)…and I believe I was the first comment on the Kathy Griffin thing…
all I ask for is a little credit….
OK, OK. Credit it is. Just keep in mind that credit goes only so far on this site. After that, we trade in cash.
cash only after a brief credit period???
I’m returning the farm animals tomorrow
If that includes cozmo’s pony, I am glad.
teejk…I salute you. I’ve never had an original thought in my life. We’ll, there WAS one that I thought was original, with the neighbor lady when I was 14, but, it turned out to be a common fantasy.
Steven
well Steven (or is it Nevets…ask Howard or Drawoh there since I don’t know when the rules will change)…
original thoughts…guess I was lucky and only had 70 yr old ladies for neighbors…so I read a lot of Mark Twain books instead.
His autobiography is sitting on my nightstand. Maybe I’ll download to kindle and begin. Then again, it’s like starting with Tolstoy or the Polish trilogy “Fire and Sword.” (Yes, those Cossacks were as bad as grandma said.) There simply isn’t enough time.
Steven
PS…There is time to complete one of my woodworking projects. Just finished a 2 tier platform for wife’s plants.
first volume of his autobiography was very disappointing…probably half was explaining how the book came together.
good luck with the plant stand. I have a few woodworking projects in mind but taking a little break as I await parts for my old CubCadet rebuild and move onto getting my old Honda running.