Dear Suse,

There was no indication or even allegation that the parents in question are drinkers, smokers, unloving or uncaring.

(as for self-medicating, I see no wrong in failing to seek the permission of the secular-priesthood class)

The first question to be asked is whether you would allow the child himself to decide about his treatment: if your answer is 'No', then there's no point to even ask the next question as to who would best be able to represent him. Different children develop differently, but as I remember myself at the age of 6, I could have answered for myself if anyone cared to listen. At least many children of 6 could answer the question, if put to them, whether they want their parents or their doctor (or perhaps someone else) to decide about their treatment.

Ideally, we would have some sage or prophet who could tell what's best for the child's soul, but sadly we don't have this luxury in our current dark age, so we need to resort to probabilities.

Medical doctors are mechanics of the body with no understanding or concern for the spiritual needs of their patients. In the general case, parents love their children far more than an unrelated doctor would or anyone else for that matter. Even parents who are afflicted by drinking generally wish the best for their children, even when the child is not with them because they are unable to care for them properly on a daily basis.

Yes there are exceptions. As we all have free choice, there could for example be parents who took up drinking only after their child chose to be born to them, but say the parents were already drinking when their child was born, then we should wonder why that child still chose them of all other parents! Most likely, it's due to the child's karma, needing to expiate for his previous actions. Perhaps that's even the purpose of his present birth, so are we going to thwart it, thereby forcing him to be born yet again to yet another couple of drunkard parents?

Yuyutsu, "Medical doctors are mechanics of the body with no understanding or concern for the spiritual needs of their patients"

That is incorrect.

The science and technology of medicine is transforming
the treatment of the very ill and injured, and millions
of people owe their health and lives to the dramatic
medical innovations of the past decades.

In particular, the new technologies have given doctors
and patients a range of difficult life-or-death choices
that they did not have even a few years ago.

For example, terminally ill patients can now be kept
alive through artificial respiration, intravenous
feeding, electronic heart stimulation, mechanical organ
substitutes, or even transplants of body parts from
other people or animals, to name just a few.

Consequently, medical dilemmas frequently become
moral and legal ones as well.

In the past most people were born and died at home.
Births and deaths happened when they happened, often
without medical intervention. If a child was too
premature or defective or if a seriously ill person
was dying, there was little the family doctor could do
about it other than to offer comfort.

Today, most people are born and die in hospitals under
the supervision of medical personnel. Physicians are
expected to do all they can to sustain life. The
medical profession today has come to rely more heavily
on scientific and technological innovations.

The
physicians of a century ago would have very little
understanding of the techniques used by their
counterparts today - but they were also spared the kinds
of moral dilemmas and life-or-death decisions that modern
physicians sometimes face. Such as giving a child a 50
percent chance at life or allowing them to die.
In practice, some physicians and parents
would try to keep these infants alive, others would hope
that their child will die. Parents and doctors
have thus become involved
in a process that some call, "Playing
God in the nursery."

Yuyutsu, I don't believe children 'choose' who they are born to, or else all the deadbeat parents in our world would surely never have more than one child, if they neglected or didn't love them. Surely no other new baby would choose those parents?
Where did you get that bizarre idea from?

How can you say that no medical doctor cares for the spiritual needs of their patients, when you can't possibly know all the doctors in the world? Are you thinking that only specially enlightened persons, like yourself, are aware of these spiritual needs?

Maybe in your personal experience you felt your doctors did not understand your 'spiritual" needs, but to be honest I don't think many on this forum understand where you are coming from most of the time : )

At the end of the day, medical doctors mainly care for the physical and mental health needs of their patients, but are also taught how to accommodate the myriad kinds of spiritual or religious needs as well, in a holistic way.
If you don't think your current Doctor understands you, then keep looking!

Dear Suse,

Just as there are bad, abusive and neglecting parents, there are guilty souls of formerly bad, abusive and neglecting parents which seek expiation through experiencing the same from the other end of the stick.

Most of us are happy to admit our aspirations for pleasure and comfort, but repress and try to avoid the social ridicule for wishing the opposite, yet those negative wishes are there and constantly drive us to do things that will bring us suffering. The will to suppress them can only last a little while, then our will breaks and the negative desires dominate.

(there are ways to limit these negative desires, such as the Christian confession, yet they are not in the least popular nowadays, but I digress)

Even doctors who do care and understand, face a conflict between their official and legal duties and the spiritual welfare of the patient. They are paid to heal the body and are held responsible to do so: I don't envy the doctor who even in this dark day and age recognises when a conflict arises between the needs of the body and the needs of the spirit - through natural selection, most of them would not remain doctors (or even medical students) for long.