As usual the fundamental truth is the first victim in unfortunately common charades like this by those who have control in these matters putting it to the attention of the common people and real issues are kept out of the public arena. Its actually creates a bit of a circus that serves to involve people, put across a intended image, entertainment etc...

Reality from a medical perspective is that this person by virtue of vegetative state looses life saving reflexes we all take for granted like the coughing reflex. Without active management they would be dead in about 3 weeks from a overwhelming lung infection which is what happen in the thousands in nursing homes to the elderly every day through out Australia.

Taking a feeding tube out is just plain unusual and cruel act which can only be compared to limiting the amount of air allowed to breath meaning basic life essentials which should never be allowed control over by law, politicians or families. What not being said here is that there has to be intensive life preserving medical intervention going on constantly to keep this person alive which is not getting any address at all.

So a common person now has to take one step back and ask the obvious question, Why this circus?...

Who gains and who are the pawns and why is the obvious not being done...

I am afraid the answers may not be pretty and reality may be just pretty ugly.

Sam

In 1984, I received a call my father was given less then 24 hours to live and was in a coma. I was told he had suffered an heart attack and would be about brain death.
Being on the other side of the world, I urged my mother to go to my fathers bedside and to make known I had said to hold on. A week later I talked to him over the phone and he was back to normal and no brain damage whatsoever! My father lived another 19 years, and died age 83!

My father had given up the will to live, but my mothers words about my message got him back, as he explained to me later!

We must never condemn any person merely because they may have some disability or otherwise. Their right to live is equal to our rights.

In my view, Terri’s husband, having pursued a large payout and commencing another family hardly could have been considered to speak for Terri without bias.

That Terri may have suffered in her condition is not the issue, rather if her suffering was not unreasonable. Where Terri’s husband allegedly denied appropriate treatment for her to have some recovery then how on earth can you then accept his claims?

Some people suffer but find that life itself is still overriding the suffering!

Also, if we kill of this woman, then where will it stop?

Soon, children or other people standing to inherit monies may want to claim that a person who is very ill stated wanting to die, not because this person did so, but because Terri’s case can be used to effectively commit legal murder!
Where will it end?

Why not clean out nursing homes using Terri’s case as an excuse?

We must never accept the deliberately killing of another human being innocent of no wrongdoing. Let alone by starvation!

Gerrit, you father did not have brain damage. Mrs Schiavo has extensive brain damage - much of her brain is gone, her EEGs are flat, she is not disabled she is completely and permanently unable. The money is gone, he was offered millions to give up guardianship but did not. It would not matter anyway, he gave up his say when he petitioned the court to decide. Rehabilitation was tried many times.

This page is a must for anyone seeking to be well informed:
http://abstractappeal.com/schiavo/infopage.html

This article is disgracefully one-sided in its characterisation of Michael Shiavo as the 'bad guy'. The references to the money involved are not based on any real evidence - at least a couple of monetary offers have been turned down by Shiavo. This includes an offer of one million dollars from an embryonic stem cell research proponent who believes the technology can save her (somewhat ironic since most 'pro-lifers' are vehemently opposed to this).

The claims by Bandalow that Michael asked "Can't you do anything to accelerate her death?" and "When is that bitch going to die?" are meaningless. There is no more evidence for these than there is for Shiavo's sisters having said that Terri would have wanted to die - something the author does not seem willing to believe.

Bandalow is extremely selective about which 'facts' he chooses to mention in the article, unsurprising for someone from a free-market think-tank.

My issue is and remains to be that if we accept that killing a person by starvation is acceptable, then soon or later others will follow suit, and we will find that the dividing line when it is deemed justified and when not will be blurred as times goes on and soon or later people who have no problems are being killed off!

In Australia, they have this policy to lock up so called “non-citizens” in concentration camp Commonwealth Detention Centres. We have a person already locked up for more then 6½ years. More then some convicted criminal may get for rape or even killing someone unlawfully. Now we find that Australians are ending up in those concentration camps also!
I warned about this already a few years ago, that if you accept the unconstitutional detention of “refugees” then it is a matter of time before Australian citizens will be locked up. And, the prime minister admitted he would not even know how many Australian citizens are locked up in those detention centers!

Again, accept the killing of a human being today, for whatever reason and tomorrow others will follow suit and start killing of people for their inheritance, or whatever.
I could not care less about him, and his claims he care for his wife, as his living situation clearly proves otherwise.
If he really cared for her, why not then remained faithful to his wife, and why did he not then provide the services she needed then?
If Terri’s husband ware the culprit, who caused the harm to her, then it would basically be that the Courts sanction him to complete his killing of his wife as to prevent her to expose him as the real culprit!
Whatever Terri’s mental state might be, and whenever the videos were taken of her, it is clear, that she was not just in a vegetable state, but nevertheless her husband than already was before the Courts to have her killed off by starvation! And, while he already had created a de facto family with children!
No Humanbeing deserves such dead!

Gerrit
I agree about your point regarding refugees and their treatment in this country and I also agree that just removing Terri's feeding tube and letting her die by starvation is worse than how we treat animals.

However, a medical examination by video particularly one involving brain activity is nothing less than a charade. As an amulance officer if I was to make such a decision I would expect to lose my job.

Terri's predicament is a case for euthanasia. Now I understand that you will start to complain where will it all end? A fair comment, however to argue that this poor woman should continue an existence such as the one she has had for the past 15 years is equally abhorrent - where will that end? People hooked up to life supports at great expense indefinitely? What does that achieve? Huge medical expenses and people literally tortured indefinitely.