As NRL News goes to press, the battle to save Terri Schindler-Schiavo goes on unabated. Most important, Terri continues to sustain her remarkable recovery from a grueling stretch of six days without food and fluids.
Next in importance, perhaps, is her family's ability to get the truth out about Terri. Bob and Mary Schindler, Terri's parents, and her brother and sister, continue to appear on network and cable television programs.
Most attention, understandably, was paid to University of South Florida Professor Jay Wolfson.
In October, when the Florida legislature passed "Terri's Law" empowering Gov. Jeb Bush to reinsert Terri's feeding tube, one of the provisions was to appoint a guardian ad litem. This individual would not replace Terri's legal guardian (her husband) but would review Terri's situation and make recommendations.
On December 2, Wolfson's 40-page report was made public.
The emphases of the ensuing newspaper stories were that Wolfson concluded that Terri is "in a persistent vegetative state [PVS] with little hope of recovery," as the St. Petersburg Times put it, and that he "also recommended a new set of swallowing tests to see if Mrs. Schiavo can eat and drink on her own. If so, he said, it might be presumed Mrs. Schiavo would want to live."
(Although Wolfson does not say so in so many words, the clear implication is that if Terri can swallow on her own, she is not in a PVS.)
Without questioning Prof. Wolfson's competence, motives, or sincerity, there were (and are) still issues he left unaddressed, perhaps because of the short 30 days he was given to report. In his response, Gov. Jeb Bush hit on some of the most important. His statement is reproduced below in full.
"I appreciate Dr. Wolfson's time and effort in this endeavor. I also respect the tremendous challenge of preparing an accurate, independent and thorough review of nearly 10 years of information in only 30 days. That Dr. Wolfson recognizes the continued need for an independent third party Guardian Ad Litem is encouraging, as is his recommendation that Mrs. Schiavo undergo swallowing tests and therapy. Based on this third party analysis, I am hopeful that Mr. Schiavo and his attorney will no longer prevent this vital testing from taking place. This would be a first step in the fresh, clean-hands start that Dr. Wolfson recommended at the end of his report.
"Taken as a whole, however, I am concerned that too many open questions still remain. Chief among them is the issue of Mrs. Schiavo's wishes, and whether or not there is clear and convincing evidence as to what those wishes were. The current court proceedings have not addressed this issue, or her current guardian's conflicts of interest, nor have I been given the opportunity to develop evidence, or test the accuracy of Mr. Schiavo's assertions on this matter.
"I am also concerned we do not know the expertise of the individuals who provided the 'answers' to the questions that are addressed in the report. I am sure that Dr. Wolfson, who indicated his reliance on 'good science-based medicine,' understands the importance of knowing which good scientists and good doctors he relied on to reach certain conclusions.
"As I have said from the beginning, the state must protect every Floridian's right to life, and in so doing, err on the side of life. As Governor, I will continue to do just that. Nothing in Dr. Wolfson's report leads me to believe the stay should be lifted at this time, or that Mrs. Schiavo should be deprived of her right to live."
In short: (1) Terri's alleged desire not to live "artificially" is based on hearsay evidence from her husband, and her husband's brother and his wife. These alleged remarks did not surface, according to Newsweek, until after Terri's husband won a $1 million medical malpractice settlement.
(2) There continues to be a sharp difference of expert medical opinion over whether Terri is in a so-called "persistent vegetative state." Florida's definition of PVS requires an "absence of voluntary action or cognitive behavior of any kind" (emphasis added). Yet those doctors who concluded Terri was in a PVS appeared to have based this diagnosis not on the "absence of voluntary action or cognitive behavior of any kind," but because her responses were "not repetitive or consistent," as Wolfson described his own assessment of Terri's reactions.
(3) It is the duty of the state to err on the side of life.
According to the Chicago Tribune, Wolfson nearly succeeded in hammering out an agreement between Bob and Mary Schindler (Terri's parents), her husband, and Gov. Bush. "The tentative agreement, arranged by Wolfson, called for independent medical testing of Schiavo and a private resolution to the matter," the Tribune reported. "But [Robert] Schindler said George Felos, the lead attorney for Schiavo's husband, backed out of the deal."
On a less public but deeply moving stage, when dozens of special needs children from Margaret K. Lewis School in Panama City, Florida, learned that Terri's 40th birthday was December 3, they made birthday cards for her. According to WMBB television, many are fed the same way Terri is. (See photo, page 2.)
"So many of these children are children with feeding tubes," Susan Perry, who works at the school, told the television station. "They are human beings just like Terri. They want her to understand they know what she's going through, and if their feeding tubes were taken away from them they would go hungry. They just want to wish her a very happy birthday."
Another center that serves adults with disabilities also made Terri birthday cards. "Over 100 cards from both schools are being collected and hand-delivered to Terri's parents," WMBB reported. But alas, even that sweet gesture was not to be allowed to last.
According to Pat Anderson, the Schindlers' attorney, earlier in the day, Mary Schindler displayed more than a dozen handmade birthday cards that were sent from disabled children in Panama City, Florida. When Mrs. Schindler returned later that day, the cards had been taken down and set on a shelf out of the way. More cards were put on display and were once again taken down and set aside. "All of these little indignities add up to one great, giant indignity, namely treating Terri as though she were dead," said Anderson.
After adamantly insisting that Terri is in a PVS, Wolfson wrote this in his report: "This having been said, Theresa has a distinct presence about her....It would be easy to detach from her if she were comatose, asleep with her eyes closed and made no noises. This is the confusing thing for the lay person about persistent vegetative states."
Maybe it's not so confusing. Maybe it's clearer than Wolfson thinks. Maybe if there is a difference of opinion, and one party to the debate wishes to starve a patient to death while the other offers to care for the patient, then the choice should be for life.