Wesley J. Smith

I wasn’t going to run with this because bioethicist Jacob M. Appel seems to be following the same business model to career success as Julian Savulescu and others: stake out the most wild and radical positions conceivable and you are sure to get attention—and perhaps big speaking . . . . Continue Reading »

I have been very unhappy about the lurid headlines in the New York Post and elsewhere about the gravely injured Natasha Richardson being “brain dead.” That is not only insensitive to her devastated family, but the term is thrown around all too loosely.Brain death is a popular term for . . . . Continue Reading »

The CIRM, which doles out $300 million of borrowed money on Californians’ credit card each year, has been a disaster from the start. We have seen mismanagement, conflicts of interest, hundreds of millions paid to buy the most expensive buildings designed by the most costly architects, etc., . . . . Continue Reading »

The Second International Symposium on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide will be held near Dulles Airport on May 29-30. I’ll be there (although I don’t like the photo in the ad), also Alex Schadenberg of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, Rita Marker, head of the International Task Force . . . . Continue Reading »

The collapse of the NHS is a horror to behold. Now, stories are coming out of what can only be described as appalling conditions in one hospital. From the story:The full extent of the horrific conditions at an NHS hospital where hundreds may have died because of ‘appalling’ care was laid . . . . Continue Reading »

A case in NJ (Betancourt v. Trinitas Regional Medical Center, Docket No. C-12-09), in which the family of a 73-year-old man diagnosed to be in a persistent vegetative state sued a hospital attempting to unilaterally withdraw extensive life support, has been decided by a judge. Properly, the trial . . . . Continue Reading »

This is a follow up report about an urgent futile care threat we warned against twice last week at SHS (here and here): After being caught flat footed with the passage of S. 1114 through the Idaho Senate—a bill that would, in part, legalize futile care theory in Idaho and specifically . . . . Continue Reading »

Compassion and Choices, the assisted suicide advocacy group, has admitted to undermining proper hospice care. That’s not how they put it, of course. It brags that nearly 100% of Oregon assisted suicides last year—88% with which their representatives were involved—were in hospice. . . . . Continue Reading »

Compassion and Choices, the assisted suicide advocacy group, has admitted to undermining proper hospice care. That’s not how they put it, of course. Instead, the group brags that nearly 100% of Oregon assisted assisted suicides last year— 88% with which their representatives were . . . . Continue Reading »

What is it with animal rights activists and nudity? Spanish liberationists have gone naked to protest a Canadian seal hunt. From the story: Around 100 people stripped naked and lay on the ground in a central Madrid square on Sunday as part of an international day of protest against Canada’s . . . . Continue Reading »