LIFEAlerts

LIFEalerts – LGBTQ+ Issues

LGBTQ+ Issues

UK – New Model for Clinicians when treating Gender Dysphoric minors

Susan and Marcus Evans are the two psychotherapists who are former employees of Tavistock Gender clinic in the UK. They presented a paper at a multi-disciplinary conference in January this year which reflects serious concerns about the transition of children before maturity. They encourage a psychotherapeutic model that provides a process of psychological exploration, in which an individual’s personality structure, beliefs, defence mechanisms, and motivations are assessed and examined in a supportive environment. This follows concerns from multiple professionals at the gender clinic, parents of gender dysphoric children, and ex-patients who regard the current “affirmative treatment” model as doing more harm. This eventually led to the High Court of England ruling that children under 16-years cannot consent to life-altering medical treatments due to immaturity.

“A rigid one-size-fits-all affirmative approach is unhelpful. Where children are concerned, we need a new model to ensure more clinically rigorous, balanced, and ethical assessment and treatment protocols. At the very least, the ordinary ethical standards of good practice must be restored to this area, as our duty, first and foremost, must always be “do no harm.”” Their proposed model concentrates on helping the child assess pain and differentiate the type, degree, and cause of pain because it can represent a helpful indication of something that needs attention. A wish to transition is often described by those who experience it as a belief that they were “born in the wrong body,” and consequently deprived of an idealized relationship with their physical self. The ideal we all have, at some level, is a self that would be loved and accepted by others, and by ourselves.

“The denial of the psychological factors influencing the desire to transition can unwittingly lead the patient and health professionals to embrace concrete, affirmative solutions, while ignoring relevant aspects of the individual’s mental-health situation and personal history.” As can be seen in “depressed patients that feel worthless and suicidal; anorexics feel too fat, and starve themselves; and obsessional patients perform rituals repetitively before other interactions.”

“A trans-identifying child can become more fixated and invested in the daydream idea, and it becomes a belief that if only they’d transition, all their problems would resolve.” Because of this, “the desire to reduce pain and anxiety by rushing into either social or medical transition needs to be resisted, as there are long-term costs that a child in a fixed state of mind is unable to imagine or understand.” More

USA – Alabama considers banning transgender drug treatment for minors

For a second time, Alabama state considers banning transgender experimental drug treatment on minors. The bill took a step forward in a hearing of the Senate Health Committee voting 11-2 approving to make it a felony for doctors to administer hormonal drug treatment that transitions people 18-years or younger who identify as transgender. Alabama is one of at least eight states where conservative lawmakers are pushing similar measures, arguing such decisions should wait until adulthood. More

LIFEalerts – IVF & Surrogacy

IVF & Surrogacy

USA – Three things people should know about egg donation

The Center for Bioethics and Culture Network feels that women who consider donating their eggs should know three things about the process before the process. Firstly, Egg Donation Often Involves Coercion because egg donation often involves poorer women providing eggs to wealthier couples. The egg donor—even when informed of known risks and potential unknown risks—is often willing to risk to her health because of financial need. Money plays a very coercive and powerful role in the market of human egg donation.

Secondly, egg donation carries health and psychological risks that often go untold because medical complications that are known, are rarely documented in the medical literature, as the individuals and organizations that are tasked with safety and oversight are also the ones who stand to profit from egg donation. The medical process required for egg retrieval is lengthy and there are known medical risks associated with each step. Risks include Ovarian Hyper Stimulation syndrome (OHSS) due to superovulation, loss of fertility, ovarian torsion, stroke, kidney disease, premature menopause, ovarian cysts, and in some rare cases, death. When an egg donor experiences harm to her health, she often feels guilty for “being so stupid” for making a decision that brought about this harm. She feels used by those she thought were professionals who cared for her. Lastly, egg donation is often eugenic because the largest sums of money are generally offered for donors of very specific educational, physical, or ethnic traits, not only perpetuating but actually incentivizing. More

LIFEalerts – Euthanasia

Euthanasia

Canada – Doctor realizes how disabled people are nudged to be euthanized

Corrina Iampen, a Canadian doctor-turned-patient after an accident left her paralyzed, who never opposed euthanasia, now feels very concerned about euthanasia and its practical application. For young and elderly patients who suddenly find themselves having to come to terms with a new disability which makes them vulnerable at this time, euthanasia can be overwhelmingly tempting, especially when good support is unavailable. Hospital staff can make disabled patients feel like a burden through their lack of interest to improve the quality of life before offering euthanasia. Corrina is also concerned about Bill C-7 which expands euthanasia in Canada especially for people with disabilities. Disability rights activists have criticized the bill calling it discriminatory to offer death to the disabled but not to people without disabilities.

She is not alone in her concerns about this expansion. In 2017, a 42-year-old man suffering from an incurable neurological condition spent more than 2 years at the London, Ontario, Hospital where he secretly recorded staff who repeatedly offering him euthanasia while his request for self-directed care were denied. In 2019, doctors were criticized for euthanizing a physically healthy but depressed 61-year-old British Columbia man. His family members said he was not of sound mind and begged him not to go through with the procedure. Another Canadian doctor, Naheed Dosani, a University of Toronto-affiliated palliative care specialist who cares for homeless people from a mobile unit, testified before the senate on February 1, saying that euthanasia is far easier to access than actual help to improve people’s lives. He said that people who’ve pursued euthanasia do so because they’ve experienced marginalization. More / Chronically ill man releases audio of hospital staff offering assisted death / Dr. Naheed Dosani Testifies at Senate on Bill C-7.

South Africa – High Court to hear terminally ill patient and doctor request for euthanasia

Susan Walter, a palliative care specialist and her patient Diethelm Harck have both been diagnosed with terminal diseases and hope to persuade Johannesburg High Court Judge Raylene Keightly to develop the law to allow euthanasia. The matter was heard on 22 February. They accuse the law as it stands and the HPCSA of impinging on their right to dignity and right to live and die as they choose. Stranger arguments have been heard in court before. The problem with their argument and accusation of Christian values being imposed is that the same values are held by the Islamic, Hinduism, and Buddhist culture, most people feel life is sacred. Usually people desperate to end their lives do not really waste time with court battles over their right to die. When looking to countries that have gone ahead of South Africa in legalizing euthanasia, it becomes clear that the practice is nothing more than legalized psychological abuse, because now the disabled, the elderly and the ones deemed to be “burdens” on a society are made to feel like they are better off dead by those grown cold at heart. Belgium’s nurses for example admit to euthanizing patients without their consent, and a wife from Texas lost her disabled husband to a doctor’s decision of euthanasia without her consent because the doctor said he wasn’t like “walking and talking people”. All this happened despite the so-called ‘safeguards’ promised by euthanasia advocates, that would prevent these concerns. If this is what happens in First world countries, what can a developing country like South Africa expect, worse? More / COVID-19 patient was black and paralyzed, so doctors decided his life wasn’t worth saving / Warning to Britain as almost half of Belgium’s euthanasia nurses admit to killing without consent

LIFEalerts – Abortion

Abortion

USA – New Study: Abortion Pill Injures more Women than FDA Reports

A team of over 30 board certified physicians spent three years reviewing thousands of pages of adverse events reports submitted to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) by abortion pill manufacturer Danco. The study was published in Issues in Law & Medicine in January this year. The study found large amounts of underreported complications. Factors that contributed to the underreporting were that 60% of surgical abortions, due to abortion pill complications, were not handled by the abortion facility, and less than half of the women who suffered complications went to the emergency room instead of getting treatment at the abortion facility. The most common complications included a failed abortion, an incomplete abortion, infection and a missed ectopic pregnancy.

“Some of the patient deaths were not known to the abortion provider until they saw the death in an obituary or were contacted by an outside source,” the researchers wrote and propose that abortion providers, hospitals, emergency departments, and private practitioners should be required to report on abortion complications. Moreover, the FDA should strengthen reporting systems because in 2016, under the Obama administration, the FDA stopped requiring Danco to report non-fatal abortion complications to the government, and the reports that were submitted lacked detail and many patients were lost to follow-up.

England de-regulated the abortion drug during the pandemic last year and saw disastrous consequences. There have been numerous reports of health and safety problems, including two women who died after taking the drugs. In another case, authorities are investigating how a woman who was 28-weeks pregnant received the abortion drugs in the mail and used them to abort her viable, late-term unborn baby. In the United States, mifepristone has been linked to at least 24 women’s deaths and 4,000 serious complications.

Because of the risk associated with taking mifepristone, coupled with misoprostol to abort unborn babies, the FDA requires abortion facilities to administer the drug in-person after an examination. Now, abortion activists are demanding that the Biden administration get rid of safety requirements for the abortion drug and allow the drug to be distributed by telemedicine, meaning the mother may never see a doctor or have an ultrasound before she takes the drug and aborts her unborn baby. Now that Marie Stopes is delivering abortion pills to South African (SA) women via Telemedicine, SA can expect similar sad results.

New Study Shows Abortion Pill is Injuring More Women Than the FDA is Reporting / Link to Study. / Study suggests abortion pill complications are underreported, and ERs are managing the majority

LIFEalerts – Alternative Medicine

Alternative Medicine

Ecuador – Police raid ‘alternative medicines’ clinic

An unlicensed clinic in the Ecuador’s capital Quito offered clients what it falsely claimed to be a $15-per-dose vaccine. The place was raided and shut down by authorities. The establishment, which was located in the south of the city, added a “vaccine” against the disease to its list of treatments and sold an estimated 70,000 doses before getting busted. What exactly the gullible recipients were injected with is yet to be determined by lab tests. The woman running the clinic claimed to be a specialist in alternative medicine, but had no formal medical degree. Ecuador has approved two vaccines – Pfizer and AstraZeneca’s. The government plans to vaccinate nine million adults for free by the end of the year. More

LIFEalerts – Sexual Exploitation

Sexual Exploitation

USA – COVID-19 Impact Exposes Millions To The Risk Of Trafficking

Although almost 50,000 victims of human trafficking were detected and reported in 2018 by 148 countries, the “hidden nature” of the crime means that the actual number of victims could be “far higher”, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said. Migrants and people without jobs were among the groups most targeted by human traffickers. “We need targeted action to stop criminal traffickers from taking advantage of the pandemic to exploit the vulnerable”. Traffickers integrate technology into their modus operandi at every stage of the process: from recruiting to exploiting victims. They saw their victims as “commodities” without regard for human dignity and rights, noting that they would “sell” fellow human beings for a price ranging from tens of dollars to tens of thousands, with large criminal organizations making the highest incomes. More

Canada – Helping women transition out of sex work

A new study called “Helping women transition out of sex work: study protocol of a mixed-methods process and outcome evaluation of a sex work exiting program” found that for women who want to, exiting sex work can be complicated by multi-traumatic symptoms and challenges related to addictions, physical and mental health problems, legal matters, housing issues, and lack of employment skills. The study focusses on evaluating the effectiveness of various exit programs in order to see if objectives are being met. Dalla (2006) identified economic instability, mental health challenges, and existing relationships with significant others as barriers to women’s successful exit out of prostitution. It also recognizes that exiting prostitution is not a straight forward process and that some women relapse a few times before they leave for good. Exit programs are there for women who desire to exit and not to force those who aren’t ready. Programs that help women exit need to address the key challenges such as housing, mental health, health and wellness, employment/vocational training/education, community and life skills, or friends and family. One such program called Exit Doors Here in Canada exists and has serves around 20-30 women a year. Study

LIFEalerts – Abortion

Abortion

Brazil – New study shows unborn baby react to needle injection causing pain

With the advent of high-definition 4-dimensional ultrasound (4D-US), it is possible to record fetal body and facial expressions. In a recent study, unborn babies undergoing an anaesthetic injection into their thigh ahead of intrauterine surgery exhibit changes in facial expression similar to newborn babies experiencing pain. The evidence gathered in this study coheres with the increasing evidence that the unborn can experience pain. Last year, a large number of MPs attended a Parliamentary webinar to discuss the evidence indicating that the unborn baby may feel pain from as early as 12 weeks’ gestation.

This study was published in the Journal of Medical Ethics and called ‘Reconsidering Fetal Pain’. In this study, they argue that women considering abortion at 12 weeks’ gestation should be told about the pain their unborn baby could experience while being terminated. Lethal injection of potassium chloride to their heart in a late-term abortion. This is the same chemical used to execute inmates in the US. The administration of potassium chloride in executions is considered so painful that it is considered necessary to first administer an anaesthetic before its use in state executions. The American College of Pediatricians has released their position statement after reviewing the scientific evidence on fetal pain at 12 weeks’ gestation, and possibly earlier, and are in full agreement with the findings. Sorting pain out of salience: assessment of pain facial expressions in the human fetus, American College of Pediatricians: Unborn Children Feel Pain, Study shows baby in the womb reacting to anaesthetic injection.

USA – Unsafe: the ground-breaking investigative report on abortion industry that endangers women

A ground-breaking 50-state investigative report on America’s abortion industry conditions is a comprehensive, documented record of the tragic consequences of that decision to make abortion legal and believing, against the evidence, that it would be safer. The report documents more than 300 facilities in 39 states that were cited for more than 2,400 health and safety deficiencies between 2008 and 2020, including hundreds of significant violations of state laws meant to ensure basic health and safety. The report also includes information on the dangers of chemical abortion drugs, abortionists’ disregard for patient safety, and their failure to report the trafficking and rape of young girls. Unsafe equips advocates and lawmakers with evidence of the need for health and safety standards. Report

Poland – Top court rules abortion in case of disability is unconstitutional

Despite the play on words by mainstream media, women are not the ones in danger if abortion on the unborn is made illegal, because it’s the unborn who gets aborted. Poland’s top court has ruled to protect unborn babies from being aborted when they are diagnosed with a disability this also means that almost all abortion in Poland is banned. Abortion will now only be permissible in cases of rape, incest or if the mother’s life is thought to be at risk which makes up only 2% of abortions. Poland will now be the country with the strictest abortion laws in Europe and recent polling results show 75% of Polish people think abortion is always wrong and can never be justified while only 7% felt otherwise. More

Africa – Help us, don’t kill us! Plead against funding of abortion

Culture of Life Africa pleads with President Biden of America, in a video, to keep President Trump’s Mexico City Policy (MCP) intact. MCP bans American taxpayer money from funding NGOs in foreign countries that promote or provide abortion. Lawyers, nurses, doctors, students, business entrepreneurs from continents all over Africa pleaded with the USA to channel funds into helping the needy, the poor, the weak, sick and homeless and that hospitals, drinkable water, food, good education and infrastructure are what they need – not abortion. African communities are built on the principles of sanctity of life, equal dignity for all, protecting the weak and vulnerable and since the right to life is inherent, the same should be afforded to the unborn child said a lawyer in the video. They hope that Biden will recognize the African Culture and respect their heart’s cry and not force western ideas and ideologies on the world of the poor. More

LIFEalerts – Euthanasia

Euthanasia

UK – Human Rights Experts alarmed at growing trend seeking euthanasia for the disabled

United Nations Human Rights experts expressed alarm at a growing trend to legalise euthanasia based largely on having a disability or disabling conditions, including in old age. They said that Disability should never be a ground or justification to end someone’s life directly or indirectly. This, the experts said, that normalizing euthanasia for the people who are not terminally ill or suffering at the end of their lives would give rise to discriminative assumptions about the inherent “quality of life” or “worth” of the life of a person with a disability. Such assumptions are grounded in ableism and associated stereotypes. Disability is not a burden or a deficit of the person. It is a universal aspect of the human condition. Article, UN Statement.

Belgium – New study finds euthanasia ethically broken in Belgium

A new study in The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy has argued that Belgian euthanasia is ethically broken, both administratively and legally. The study draws on thoroughly researched academic research over the past 20 years and the reports of the control commission itself. The authors three main assertions are; the scope of the Euthanasia Law

That has stretched from being used for serious and incurable illnesses to cover tiredness of life. Tiredness of life is not supported by Belgian law but doctors circumvent the law by diagnosing “polypathology”– a jumble of ailments which nearly every elderly person has. This represented 19.4% of all reported euthanasia cases in 2019 and a “staggering” 47% of all reported nonterminal cases.

“Second, the obligatory consultation of one or two independent physicians may fail to provide a real safeguard. Their tasks are quite limited, and, more importantly, their advice is not binding anyway. The final authority to perform euthanasia lies with the attending physician who can perform it even against the (negative) advice of the consulted physicians.” For example: If euthanasia is requested for a psychiatric condition, a psychiatrist should be consulted. However, if the patient has another condition, it can be redefined as “polypathology” and a GP can approve it, eliminating the need for a psychiatric consultation.

Third, “The Commission is unable to check the fulfilment of various legal criteria, and it has substantial authority to (re) interpret the Euthanasia Law as it sees fit.” In fact, “the Commission does not seem to act as a filter between physicians who perform euthanasia and the Public Prosecutor, but instead as a shield that prevents potentially problematic cases from being referred.”

Conflict of interest is baked into the composition of the 16-member evaluation committee. Eight of them must be doctors and many of them, including the chairman, Wim Distelmans, perform euthanasia regularly. So they end up checking each other’s files for irregularities. They are supposed to recuse themselves if one of their own cases comes up – but they don’t. The Commission’s track record illustrates its ineffectiveness. In 18 years of legalisation, only one case was referred to the Public Prosecutor and it was so obviously in breach of the law that referral was needed to keep up appearances. Article, study.

LIFEalerts – IVF & Surrogacy

IVF & Surrogacy

Australia – Class action lawsuit against IVF clinic might be the biggest case yet

A class action was just lodged against Monash IVF Pty Ltd, the owner of IVF clinics in Australia. The legal documents were filed in the Supreme Court of Victoria against Monash IVF on behalf of patients who had embryos genetically tested with the IVF clinic between May 2019 and October 2020. The allegations were that the fertility provider might have destroyed healthy embryos through a faulty non-invasive genetic screening test (PGT-A test), meaning that embryos may have been incorrectly labelled as abnormal, generating false-positive results. The IVF patients are suing for tens of millions of dollars in compensation, with some concerned they may have been deprived of their chance of bearing offspring. More than 1,000 patients could be victims, making it one of the most significant class actions ever lodged against a fertility provider in Australia. More

LIFEalerts – Medical Ethics

Medical Ethics

USA – New state plan to decide life-saving treatment of overwhelmed hospitals

The NC Institute of Medicine, the NC Healthcare Association, and the NC Medical Society developed a hospital triage released a plan to help guide medical providers navigate ethical questions of who would get life-saving treatment when hospitals are overwhelmed by critically ill patients, and running out of equipment or space in a pandemic. The plan ranks patients based on how well their vital organs are functioning, as well as determinations of whether they would live long enough to leave the hospital if they got intensive medical care. The goal is to do the greatest good for the greatest number. This is different from the traditional focus of medical ethics, which is centered on promoting the well-being of individual patients.

In a webinar with reporters, one doctor said this was a dramatic shift in the thinking of physicians and the public’s expectations of medical staff during times of shortages. This is difficult for medical providers who take a professional oath to save individual lives whenever possible and this shift is uncomfortable for everyone involved. Some concerns that medical staff had about making decisions using patient health scores were about whether internal biases would creep in and whether all doctors’ medical assessments were reliable. More

USA – Physician coalition calls for ethical vaccines devoid of reliance on abortion derived fetal cell lines

The American College of Pediatricians, the American Association of Pro-life Ob-Gyns, the Christian Medical and Dental Associations et al, released a joint statement calling for the development of ethical vaccines devoid of any reliance upon abortion derived fetal cell lines. “Recent reports of the effectiveness of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines, which are both mRNA vaccines, are encouraging. Although it is true that the animal-phase testing for these vaccines used abortion-derived fetal cells, commendably, it does not appear that production methods utilized such cells.” The statement concluded that if COVID-19 vaccines are approved as safe and effective, then use of the least ethically problematic vaccine available in the prevention of disease and death can be justified. More

South Africa – SA suspends vaccine AstraZeneca immunization campaign

South Africa’s (SA) first immunisation campaign has been halted since the coronavirus vaccine, AstraZeneca, has been found to show less protection than elsewhere. The South African trial of the vaccine, conducted in about 2000 people, found such a low efficacy against mild and moderate disease, under 25%, that it fails to meet minimal international standards for emergency use. COVID-19 vaccines made by Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and Novavax also offer weaker protection against the SA variant that causes the vast majority of all infections in South Africa. Shabir Madhi of the University of the Witwatersrand, the trial’s principal investigator, was still optimistic because the J&J and AstraZeneca still convincingly protected against severe disease and death. More

USA – Ultrasound treatment used to recover coma patients with severe brain injuries

In 2016, a team led by UCLA’s Martin Monti reported that a 25-year-old man recovering from a coma had made remarkable progress following treatment to jump-start his brain using ultrasound. In the journal Brain Stimulation, Monti and colleagues now report that two more patients with severe brain injuries have made impressive progress thanks to the same technique. Monti, a UCLA professor of psychology and neurosurgery considers this new result much more significant because these chronic patients were much less likely to recover spontaneously than the acute patient they treated in 2016. The scientists used a technique called low-intensity focused ultrasound, which uses sonic stimulation to excite the neurons in the thalamus. The hope is to translate the technology into an inexpensive, portable device so the treatment could even be delivered at patients’ homes. More