japanese war crimes-- was hiroshima

A researcher, with full
condemnation of the Nazi work, asserted that using the results of
certain experiments (e.g., anoxia and hypothermia) for legitimate
treatment-oriented research was at least some ethical recompense that
the victims hadn't died completely in vain.

That certainly makes sense to me. How can we possibly justify throwing
away knowledge because we don't like the way in which it was attained?

When we start making judgment calls like this, we could, for example,
demand that the U.S. dismantle its nuclear plants on the ground that
they would not exist if the Manhattan Engineer District hadn't set out
to build the bomb that killed the residents of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email:

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

In article , Cub Driver
wrote:

A researcher, with full
condemnation of the Nazi work, asserted that using the results of
certain experiments (e.g., anoxia and hypothermia) for legitimate
treatment-oriented research was at least some ethical recompense that
the victims hadn't died completely in vain.

That certainly makes sense to me. How can we possibly justify throwing
away knowledge because we don't like the way in which it was attained?

While some of the argument against it is pure condemnation of the
physicians involved -- we cast you out of our consideration (indeed, a
later Nuremburg trial cast several by the neck until dead, while others
committed suicide), a more mainstream argument is that they don't ever
want to leave a loophole by which some future researcher might do work
with involuntary subjects, and damage them.

It's not a simple situation, with many ramifications beyond what I've
described. Some researchers feel it is totally impossible to get truly
independent consent from prisoners.

An unfortunate reality, however, is that prison medical care can be very
bad outside research trials -- which have separate funding and
personnel. I recently went through some expert testimony in a suit
regarding close to 100 deaths, relatively recently, in a US state
prison. Most of these -- not associated with a research trial -- could
either have been prevented with proper care, or at least have been much
more comfortable and dignified deaths than lying on the floor outside
the prison infirmary.



When we start making judgment calls like this, we could, for example,
demand that the U.S. dismantle its nuclear plants on the ground that
they would not exist if the Manhattan Engineer District hadn't set out
to build the bomb that killed the residents of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.


I can't really give you a reasoned reply to that other than a gut
feeling that such an argument is farther from the specifics than of the
research studies. There's no question that the research subjects of
Siegfried Rascher and his ilk (especially known for anoxia, but also
hypothermia experiments) were not in any sense licit volunteers. The
problem in the other argument is that the residents of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki may have been licit collateral victims of a lawful attack.

There's a lot of professional nervousness about "medicalizing" things
that don't have a pure medical quality. These range from forcibly
treating a psychotic criminal [1] with medications to render them sane,
to some of the truly bizarre features of an execution by lethal
injection [2]. There are questions about whether it is constitutional to
rely on psychiatric testimony to confine a prisoner who completed the
court-ordered sentence. I have no simple answers.

[1] My gut reaction here is that it can be reasonable to medicate a
prisoner so they are not a danger to themselves or others. It can be
reasonable to medicate them so they can participate in their defense,
although if it's necessary to medicate them for that purpose, it seems
you've made the case for hospitalization rather than prison. It gets
very messy if the mental illness developed after the crime, so you can't
really use an insanity defense.
Medicating someone simply to let them understand they are being
executed, however, strikes me as cruel and unusual punishment.

[2] The apparently universal protocol used for lethal injection simply
doesn't make much sense. It uses three drugs in succession, the only
rationale for this is that it essentially duplicates the procedure used
for stopping the heart for open heart surgery -- which I have had.
In the lethal injection protocols I've first drug injected, an
ultrashort acting barbiturate, differs in the quantity that would be
given in surgery. The protocols note that a lethal dose is given.
Short and ultrashort acting barbiturates are the drugs used in
veterinary and legal human (Dutch, for example) euthanasia. That drug
would suffice, unless someone has a bizarre desire to make it more of a
standard medical procedure.
Using an alcohol swab, ostensibly to prevent infection, on someone
who will be dead in an hour seems to speak for itself. Ironically,
European practice is generally not to use alcohol rubs for normal
injection. At best, in normal practice, a quick rub does some cleaning,
but clearly does not disinfect. Alcohol must be in continuous contact
with the surface for at least 2 minutes for even low-level disinfection,
and 10 minutes for greater surety.

Using an alcohol swab, ostensibly to prevent infection, on someone
who will be dead in an hour seems to speak for itself

Well, perhaps it's for the sake of the doctor, either to reassure him
that what he's doing is a normal medical procedure, or perhaps only so
he won't get out of the habit of disinfecting when he's dealing with
people he's trying to save!

Thank you, Howard, for a sane and reasoned take on a difficult
subject.


all the best -- Dan Ford
email:

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

In article , Cub Driver
wrote:

Using an alcohol swab, ostensibly to prevent infection, on someone
who will be dead in an hour seems to speak for itself

Well, perhaps it's for the sake of the doctor, either to reassure him
that what he's doing is a normal medical procedure, or perhaps only so
he won't get out of the habit of disinfecting when he's dealing with
people he's trying to save!

Thank you, Howard, for a sane and reasoned take on a difficult
subject.

The subject gets truly weird at times. One anti-lethal-injection legal
campaign, rejected by the courts, pointed out that thiopental sodium,
pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride had not been given an FDA
"safe and effective" approval for the indication of execution.

It turns out that the FDA does, in fact, approve drugs for the specific
purpose of veterinary euthanasia, and, in keeping with the regulations
on drug approvals, designates them "safe and effective" for the marketed
purpose.

Think about that one for a while. Moderate consumption of ethanol, in
your choice of flavor, is usually safe and effective for the resulting
brain tilt.

It turns out that the FDA does, in fact, approve drugs for the specific
purpose of veterinary euthanasia,

Isn't that sodium pentathol? (I'm not sure about the spelling.) We
once put down a St Bernard who weighed almost as much as I do, and at
the time I marveled what an easy death that was.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email:

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

Cub Driver wrote:

Isn't that sodium pentathol? (I'm not sure about the spelling.) We
once put down a St Bernard who weighed almost as much as I do, and at
the time I marveled what an easy death that was.

I've done the "final visit to the vet" on several occasions. It's
the downside of the wonderful experience of owning a pet [dog].

The end comes so quickly and quietly, it really makes me wonder.
Is it "inhumane" to apply on humans? Would it really be "unethical"?

As opposed to often months of watching someone you care for die
with the aid of "advanced medicine".

Sometimes "ethical" and "humane" seem antagonistic.


SMH

In article , Cub Driver
wrote:

It turns out that the FDA does, in fact, approve drugs for the specific
purpose of veterinary euthanasia,

Isn't that sodium pentathol? (I'm not sure about the spelling.) We
once put down a St Bernard who weighed almost as much as I do, and at
the time I marveled what an easy death that was.

The standard used to be sodium pentabarbitol (Nembutal), although
thiopental would work in lower dose, it is more expensive. My
understanding is that some veterinarians use barbiturates specifically
compounded for euthanasia, rather than a standard drug.

The amount of overdose (corrected for the particular drug) and the speed
with which it's injected may have as much to do with the soeed of effect
in veterinary use. I've seen cats have their life functions stop almost
instantaneously from a large intravenous dose of pentobarbital. In
general medical practice where death is not desirable, you wouldn't give
it that fast. Pentothal and related ultrashort acting drugs like
brevital naturally act extremely fast when being dripped in at a slower
rate, which is probably safer for anesthesia.

In anesthesia, if something goes wrong, you don't want instantaneous
onset -- you want something slow enough such that if something goes
wrong, the anesthesiologist has time to react.

In article , Stephen Harding
wrote:

Cub Driver wrote:

Isn't that sodium pentathol? (I'm not sure about the spelling.) We
once put down a St Bernard who weighed almost as much as I do, and at
the time I marveled what an easy death that was.

I've done the "final visit to the vet" on several occasions. It's
the downside of the wonderful experience of owning a pet [dog].

The end comes so quickly and quietly, it really makes me wonder.
Is it "inhumane" to apply on humans? Would it really be "unethical"?

As opposed to often months of watching someone you care for die
with the aid of "advanced medicine".

Sometimes "ethical" and "humane" seem antagonistic.


It's a terribly difficult question. I did feel a deep emotional bond
with my last cat to die, who seemed to tell me when he still wanted to
go on -- and there were, indeed, treatment options for his bladder
cancer. He wound up not being euthanized but dying at home. Before he
died, he spent a long time in my arms, and I'd swear we agreed that it
was OK for him to go. To my surprise, as opposed to my other cat, be
chose not to die with me holding him. I had fallen asleep from sheer
exhaustion, but I (and my ex-wife) sat bolt awake at the same moment,
which probably was close to what we can reconstruct was the time of
death.

It was much more difficult with my mother, although there were
significant differenes. She had metastatic breast cancer in 1975, and,
while she was in active treatment, I wound up in role beyond the usual
surrogate responsibility -- a fair bit of the staff didn't tell her
things but would want me to break news and get decisions.

She phoned me at one point, telling me that the nurses were annoying
her, asking her to put in several IVs to "build up your strength, dear."
It fell to me to tell her the truth: that the IVs were very
specifically to counter a drug reaction that would, untreated, kill her
painlessly in 48-72 hours. I felt I had to give her the options --
there was one more treatment that might have any hope, although the
chance of it working was low. I explicitly told her I would suppport her
decision either way, and didn't consider it cowardly if she chose to
refuse the immediate treatment.

The long-term outcome was bad. She did respond to the immediate
treatment, but the new treatment was ineffective. She was then
transferred to a VA hospital (she had retired medically from the Army
Reserve), and the VA staff was far less willing to accept any input from
someone even named in an advanced directive. She crumbled for several
months, including a phase of brain metastasis where she felt her
consciouness and memory slipping away. At that point, I told her staff
comfort measures only -- do not attempt to cure potentially fatal
complications such as pneumonia. They refused, and, indeed, insisted on
intense life support even when she certainly was no longer conscious,
and was not going to wake up.

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 07:22:44 -0500, Stephen Harding
wrote:

Cub Driver wrote:

Isn't that sodium pentathol? (I'm not sure about the spelling.) We
once put down a St Bernard who weighed almost as much as I do, and at
the time I marveled what an easy death that was.

I've done the "final visit to the vet" on several occasions. It's
the downside of the wonderful experience of owning a pet [dog].

The end comes so quickly and quietly, it really makes me wonder.
Is it "inhumane" to apply on humans? Would it really be "unethical"?

As opposed to often months of watching someone you care for die
with the aid of "advanced medicine".

Sometimes "ethical" and "humane" seem antagonistic.


SMH

I have problems with actual termination of humans-- it opens so many
cans of worms, legal and ethical alike.
But...
I've seen friends and family kept alive long past the point where
they woudl naturally die. Long past the point where there was any
hope that they would get better-- in extreme cases where you just had
a mindless husk being kept alive by machines.
I think the problem is that the idea that the doctor will do
everything to keep you alive has ignored the fact that we *are* going
to die at some point, and that as medical technology gets more
advanced that point that be delayed long past where it should happen.
But on the other hand, that's a terrible decision to make-- and there
have been cases of criminal or ethical charges being brought against
doctors who have done so, even with the cooperation of the family.
Dr. Kevorkians antics didn't help the debate any either, of cousre.

Howard Berkowitz wrote:

It's a terribly difficult question. I did feel a deep emotional bond
with my last cat to die, who seemed to tell me when he still wanted to
[...]

Definitely the tough side of having a pet.

It was much more difficult with my mother, although there were
significant differenes. She had metastatic breast cancer in 1975, and,

[...]

consciouness and memory slipping away. At that point, I told her staff
comfort measures only -- do not attempt to cure potentially fatal
complications such as pneumonia. They refused, and, indeed, insisted on
intense life support even when she certainly was no longer conscious,
and was not going to wake up.

Sounds like you've been through the wringer. Been there myself so I
can sympathize.

Problem is, medical people are trained to "keep people alive". You
know, "do no harm", at least in a physical sense.

Technology can drive a glimmer of hope in immortality. "It's not
*fair* to die; we can *fix* it!" We all know we die. We just
don't believe it.

Death is natural. But sometimes, it seems the medical community,
and the consumer of medical services, looks upon it as a cop out
or a failure.

Irrespective of our feelings, eventually, it's simply time to go!


SMH