Two-thirds disagree with BMA guidelines

By Simon Caldwell

ALMOST two thirds of people in the United Kingdom do not believe doctors have a legal right to starve and dehydrate vulnerable patients to death, according to a survey published this week.

The survey was: carried out on more than 2,000 people nationwide, for First Do No Harm, an offshoot of the World Federation of Doctors who Respect Human Life and an affiliated member of the Medical Ethics Alliance.

It asked the question: "The British Medical Association says that doctors may withhold tube feeding and hydration from patients such as victims of a stroke, who are not dying but might be permanently disabled. This would make them die for lack of fluid. Some other doctors' groups disagree with the BMA. Do you think doctors should have a legal right to withhold food and fluids?"

Responses. fluctuated depending on location of the people asked to take part in the survey, and while between 14 and 38 per cent of those interviewed said doctors had the right to withhold food and
fluids, between 49 and 65 per cent felt that no such right exists: Between seven and 14 per cent were undecided.

The greatest support for euthanasia came in the West Midlands, while the greatest opposition came from the North.

The poll was taken in the wake of the BMA guidelines which call for an end for the need for court orders before doctors can withdraw food and fluids from all patients, which critics believe
will admit euthanasia through the back door.

Dr Gregory Gardiner, a Birmingham GP and a member of First Do No Harm's committee, said the results of the poll indicated widespread unease and fear among the public over the prospect of euthanasia.

He said: "This fear is of health care teams deciding on whether selected vulnerable people should live or die. Trust between patients and the medical profession is beginning to break down as organisations such as the BMA are used to subvert the ancient principles on which that trust is based.

"Ethical principles `are quietly removed and new ones put in place. The meaning of basic care is gradually altered. The' new ethics replaces trust with a dangerous and paternalistic medical autonomy. Patients would be even more worried if they knew the whole truth."

Dr Peggy Norris of the anti-euthanasia pressure group, Alert said: "It is horrifying that the BMA suggests withholding nutrition and fluid from helpless patients. `First do no harm' has been the basis for medical practice for 2,000 years. The Holocaust of 50 years ago is the evidence of what happens when doctors abandon this basic Hippocratic ethic."