A few Terri notes

- A law in Texas empowers a hospital's ethics committee to authorize doctors to remove patients from life support if it determines further care is futile and the patient is unable to pay for the care. Families are given 10 days' notice to give them time to look for a facility that will take the patient.

Two cases, one of them in court and the other which may be headed there, have brought more attention to the practice. The former involves 5-month-old Sun Hudson, diagnosed shortly after birth with a fatal form of dwarfism. His mother wants the hospital to continue treatment; the hospital wants to stop.

The latter is about one Spiro Nikolouzos, a 68-year-old retired engineer who survives on a ventilator and artificial feedings. Mr. Nikolouzos, who experienced bleeding in his brain, is very unlikely to improve and the hospital wants to discontinue his life support. The family's attorney charges that the hospital wants to discontinue care because Nikolouzos' Medicare funding is running out.

The point here is that the legislation was signed into law on June 20, 1999 - by then-Governor George W. Bush, who returned from a campaign trip just in time to do so.

- ABC News for March 21 carried a pretty good explanation of what goes into determining someone is in a persistent vegetative state and how that differs from a minimally conscious state. The best part was the end:

"The difference is between autonomic activity and episodic conscious activity," said [Joseph] Fins[, chief of the medical ethics division of New York Presbyterian Hospital]. "It's something that can be observed by a neurologist or detected on a brain scan. It's not a diagnosis that legislators can make after viewing videotapes."

- The Columbia Journalism Review had some good thoughts about the horrible press coverage of the situation, coverage that

has consistently skewed toward the emotional over the factual. ... Most stories feature dueling quotes from Schiavo's media-savvy parents and her embattled husband, people whose anger over a difficult and emotional issue have been elevated to a national stage. More often than not, the tearful parents get top billing. ... And, of course, there's the heartbreaking photo of Schiavo that has graced many of the Web stories on the case....

- The Hartford (CT) Courant, among a number of others, noted that on Sunday that

Republican officials declared, in a memo that was supposed to be seen only by senators, that they believe their attention to the issue could pay dividends with Christian conservatives, whose support is essential in midterm elections such as those coming up in 2006.

Monday's Christian Science Monitor expanded on the point, reporting that

[b]ehind the move by many Republicans on Capitol Hill is a desire to advance a "culture of life" agenda that they think will be important in the 2006 elections and beyond. At the same time, many conservative groups see the fight to save Mrs. Schiavo as an extension of the war over judicial nominations and "activist" judges.

Seems to me I just said that:

I have no doubt that those pushing [the issue] are already writing up their "activist judge" screeds and "I was for Terri" campaign ads.

- But it might not work out as well for the GOPpers as they imagine. Reuters said today that

Americans broadly and strongly disapprove of the intervention by Congress in the case of Terri Schiavo and most believe lawmakers are using her case for political gain, according to an ABC News poll published on Monday.

Seventy percent deemed the congressional intervention inappropriate, while 67 percent said they believe lawmakers became involved in the Schiavo case for political advantage rather than the principles involved.

A strong majority - 63% - supported the removal of the feeding tube, a figure that reflected the views of 54% of conservatives and 46% even of evangelical Christians. While both those groups were more likely than the general population to support federal intervention, that remained a minority position even among them.