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NEWS > EVERYONE ELSE > CATHOLIC CHURCH ORDERS FEEDING TUBE FOR SLEEPING MAN
CATHOLIC CHURCH ORDERS FEEDING TUBE FOR SLEEPING MAN
December 4 2009
Rome, Italy – The case of Rom Houbens, the Belgian man believed to be trapped in a vegetative state for 23 years only to revealed as fully conscious and aware, has brought new arguments to the debate over coma’s and long term medical care. It was 
only major advances in brain imaging, unavailable when Houbens was first injured, that finally allowed doctors to realize that his brain functions were still that of a normal person, bringing hope that the same may in fact be the case for hundreds of others in similar conditions.
For advocates of the injured the case has given new hope not only that people in such situations may in fact have hope, but that the decision making process that allows life support to be removed be taken out of the hands of doctors. Chief amongst those advocates is the Catholic Church which has long advocated sustaining life not matter the cost. The Church, in light of the Houbens case, has ordered feeding doctors at all their hospitals to ignore patient’s wishes and sustain lives no matter the severity of the injury. Already though that declaration has fallen out favour after two patients at a Rome hospital were fitted with feeding tubes after falling asleep.
“Everyone has been told to keep it quiet but I can tell you it happened. The news is all over the hospital and it’s gotten a lot of people concerned. Not just for the moral and ethical implications but the fact that many doctors and nurses working double shifts end up sleeping at the hospital which could end up getting them put on life support,” said a Hospital insider who preferred not to be named. “The problem isn’t so much that they being forced to put tubes into patients with traumatic brain injuries, it’s that they have a quota to fulfill and will likely end up sticking tubes down just about everyone’s throats. The Church has been waiting for this for a long time and frankly they are putting a lot of pressure on doctors to make sure that they put it in the net.”
Two nurses at the same hospital reported incidents of waking up to large tubes coming at their faces but thus far only two patients have been affected.
“Unfortunately one would have hoped that such incidents would be isolated, perhaps the result of some rogue doctor bent on furthering the interests of the church, but that appears to not be the case. The incidents in this hospital were apparently the only successful attempts but not the only attempts. All across Rome and in Church run hospitals around the world feeding tubes are becoming far more prominent. I fear we may be looking at a feeding tube war of epic proportions,” said Scrape TV Medical analyst Dr. Phillip Waites. “It’s very unfortunate because unnecessary medical can cause serious issues. Granted, people won’t have to think about what they are going to have for dinner, but the trade-off really isn’t worth it and could be dangerous.”
Pope Benedict reportedly approved the edict personally being a great fan of feeding tubes in his personal life.
“Hopefully cooler heads will prevail in the coming days and weeks. There’s little doubt that a reassessment of our policies towards people with these types of injuries is due but this type of reactionary behaviour cannot be tolerated, for the good of patients who both need the help and those who don’t,” continued Waites. “Whether or not that effort will convince the Church to back off on this aggressive stance or not is a different issue but hopefully it will help them to see reason and stop forcing tubes down people’s throats.”
The Church had no comment on the situation as they were out to lunch when we contacted them.
Emil Uliya, International Correspondent
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