"The Hunger Disease"

There's an important distinction to be made between those who refuse nutrition at the end of their lives, and someone who is starved to death while fully alive.

Terri Schiavo did not have a terminal illness. She was not dying. She was not even close to death. As of last Friday, she was a young, physically healthy, though severely disabled, woman.

The press, as in this Chicago Tribune article, is quoting certain "experts" as saying that depriving someone of food and water is a painless and peaceful way to die.

But here's the problem: The article above quoted hospice workers. Hospices are places for people who are dying. They have terminal illnesses and very little time left to live -- months at best, probably only weeks or days.

When those people choose to stop eating, or stop tube feedings, it's usually because their bodies have already begun dying. Their digestive systems really aren't operating anymore.

If a person already in the death process is deprived of food and water for the last few hours or even days of his life, there most likely is no pain. They're not dying of starvation, because they've already begun the dying process from some other cause.

But we're not talking about someone who was in the death process. Terri Schiavo, as of last Friday, was actively living. All her organs were operating, functioning fully, requiring food and water. Her digestive system hadn't shut down; it was active. All her cells were requiring the usual amount of water and nutrition.

To starve a living person to death is quite the opposite of the natural death process.

Think Auschwitz, and what they called "the hunger disease".

If something doesn't happen soon to save her life, Terri will die of the hunger disease.