By Filings on
Society & Culture
Bioethics
Sanctity of Life
Alfie Evans

“Everyone knows that resources are finite and demands can be great, and times may come when providers may feel that time and money spent in prolonging life in hard cases may be spent better in helping somebody else. This wasn’t the case with the two children now dead in England, whose parents were stopped, not from trying to draw upon government funds, but from trying to use their own money to help them.” W.Examiner

Discussion

Wed, 05/02/18

One of the interesting things about this case is that not only was there not a clear cost to the NHS of allowing Alfie to go to Rome, there also was not a clear diagnosis for his condition. It’s a step worse than the Terri Schiavo case that way—at least they knew what had happened to her!

Now if the hospital in Rome had been able to help the young man, or even if they hadn’t, but the doctors had learned something about the condition that might have been able to help others, that provokes a crisis for the NHS and the government that funds it. It would have been pretty much proof that not only was the NHS not capable of providing first class healthcare, but moreover that the entire notion of trying had passed from their corporate culture. It could have been the death of the NHS, really.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.