Wesley J. Smith

A Concise History of Euthanasia by Ian Dowbiggin. Rowan and Littlefield, 176 pages, $22.95 To read Ian Dowbiggins’s A Concise History of Euthanasia is to learn that in more than a century of advocacy for euthanasia, the arguments have barely changed at all. The drive to legalize killing . . . . Continue Reading »

There has been some agitating lately to legalize assisted suicide/euthanasia in India, of all places. Apparently, the government has turned a firm thumb’s down. . . . . Continue Reading »

Jonathan Alter goes after Bush’s veto of the ESCR funding expansion bill in this Newsweek column. But he is ignorant about the actual policy, as demonstrated by this line, “No lab that receives federal financing can take part in embryonic-stem-cell research.”This isn’t true, . . . . Continue Reading »

I have a piece in the newly released Weekly Standard about “embryonic stem cell mantra,” and the lack of coverage about adult stem cell research advances. I think it requires a subscription to access, but here is the link (which may be generally accessible later).For those who . . . . Continue Reading »

Another apparent adult stem cell advance: A hospital in the UK is pioneering a treatment for people whose broken bones do not heal—perhaps preventing the need for amputations. From the Telegraph report:“Doctors at the Robert Jones & Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital, Oswestry, Shropshire, . . . . Continue Reading »

This story is a bit suspect. It claims that three Japanese nationals were declared “brain dead” in Canada and the USA, but later recovered after being transported back to Japan. The term “brain dead” is notoriously misused. For example, one of the patients was breathing on . . . . Continue Reading »

UK scientists are offering unfertile women thousands of pounds off the price of IVF treatments if they agree to “donate” their eggs for use in biomedical research—meaning cloning. The scheme was necessary because the human cloners did not have enough eggs to pursue their cloning . . . . Continue Reading »

Regular readers of Secondhand Smoke will recall the trouble that author Pamela Winnick and her family were having with a few physicians they named collectively “Dr. Death,” who kept trying to pressure them into “pulling the plug” on her father. Here is the latest update from . . . . Continue Reading »

This poll by Gallup is a bit unfair in its wording, but what else is new? Still, I believe it shows what I have been thinking to be true; that the stem cell issue does not cut deeply.6. As you may know, earlier this week, President Bush vetoed a bill that would have expanded federal funding for . . . . Continue Reading »

This is a great column by lawyer Elizabeth R. Schiltz, published in Business Week. The mother of a Down’s child, Schiltz blisters the pressure people like her are put under to abort Down syndrome babies:“I’ve come to realize that many in the scientific and medical community view me . . . . Continue Reading »