Tiny Babies, Large Questions: Ethical Issues in Prenatal and Neonatal Care
Sixth Annual Pediatric Bioethics Conference Friday and Saturday, July 23, 24, 2010
Bell Harbor International Conference Center, Seattle, Washington
Dr. Norman Fost, who coauthored the Ashley paper with Dr. Diekema in AJOB this April, will be one of the speakers as usual. His presentation is titled, “Whatever Happened to Baby Doe? The Transformation from Under-treatment to Over-treatment.”
I just want to add some info. The AAP’s bioethics committee, headed by Dr. Diekema developed a position statement on forgoing nutrition and hydration from children in July. You can read its full text free of charge from the link below.
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/124/2/813
The Diekema and Botkin piece is truly horrendous, morally and otherwise. I concur with the conclusion of G. Dr. Kevin Donovan, in a letter to the journal Pediatrics, discussing the Diekema and Botkin article, and published here (footnote omitted):
For example, the following passage, from the article, could have been written jointly had an unlikely partnership developed between George Orwell and Josef Mengele: