Could, and should, greater effort have been expended attempting to ascertain whether Archie Battersbee was alive and conscious, and his wishes and feelings about the proposed ending of his life-support treatment?
Archie Battersbee was in hospital when he died, brain-injured so badly that if he was conscious, he was unable to exhibit consciousness by (say) responding verbally to ordinary enquiries addressed to him, questions such as, “Are you comfortable?”, or by moving fingers or facial muscles to answer such questions. He may even have been brain-stem dead by the time his treatment was withdrawn. I hope he was already brain dead for his sake, given what has been done to him. Perhaps a post-mortem will shed more light on that unknown.
Reportedly, Archie was in a coma, apparently unable to breathe without artificial support. The learned barrister and blogger Matthew Scott has posted today saying that Mr Justice Hayden was right to bring Archie’s futile treatment to an end. On the limited evidence before the public and Hayden J, I am not minded to dispute the rightness of the learned judge’s ruling, or of Matthew’s applauding of it. However, I suspect that, by all accounts, the hospital may have fallen short of the need to make adequate accommodations for a patient who may have suffered from a communication disability rather than a loss of all consciousness, as in the case of the late Scott Routley. Continue reading
In the still-unfolding, still-unfinished aftermath of the bitterly-disputed US Presidential Election of 2020, it seems like only yesterday – because it was only yesterday – that the United States of America was reportedly teetering on the brink of turmoil on the streets. Turmoil that would be at least a nuisance and, perhaps, far worse, internecine. The nation had also seemed to be in peril of the state meting out repression upon those who manifested their heterodox belief in a conspiracy theory opposed to the opposing conspiracy theory in which believe those who now have the upper hand politically. 
“Mummy-eee … it said on the news that Boris Johnson had acted unlawfully. Does that mean he’s a crook and will have to go to prison?”
“I don’t know, darling. Mr Corbyn and his party will have to decide that. Let’s wait and see what they say.”
I 
I am neither a solicitor nor a barrister. I have never been, or claimed to be, either.
Cet animal est très méchant. Quand on l’attaque, il se défend.
JohnAllman.UK 