Life Matters
Of Hospice and Holy Days
by Earl E. Appleby, Jr
As we all know only too well, the devil has no holidays. A Luxembourg saying reminds us, "The holier the day, the madder
the devil." In any event, a flier for a local hospice exploits the approaching holidays, that is, holy days, to preach a gospel
which is anything but Good News for the sick.
The pro-death tract is noteworthy more for what it leaves unsaid than for what it says.
It's title, What Does Hospice Do?, begs the vital questions--"What does hospice not do?...and why?"
For answers that could spell the difference between life and death for your loved ones, please read on.
The hospice handout begins with a quote from an unidentified Dr. Cecily Saunders. Dame Saunders, the original pied piper
of hospice, founded thefirst modern hospice in London in 1967, "St. Christopher's." Irony, as we shall see, comes a close
second to hand-holding in the hospice sect.
For if the genuine St. Christopher is remembered for bravely bearing Christ on his strong shoulders across the raging
waters, his name-droppers simply hold your hand as you drown. As Time magazine reports, at the pseudo-"St.
Christopher's":
No heroic efforts were made to prolong life. There was no operating theater; no temperatures were taken or pulses
recorded. Instead of specialists...there were doctors...holding patient's trembling hands. When death came, it was not with
the accompaniment of IV drips and respirator but; with tranquil normality.
My hands would tremble too, if they were never held to take a pulse, because I had been written off as "terminal." Indeed,
they trembled when my father "terminally ill" with cancer was denied the same "ordinary" care (pulse and temperature, that
is, vital signs) at a hospital, not a hospice, just days before his death.
"What is the difference between a hospice and a hospital?" The honest answer: "less and less." D.C. General Hospital's
director, John Dandridge, however, stressed a significant difference in their purpose when he testified before the Washington
City Council that his hospital "does not want to shift resources to [hospice] a treatment that conflicts with its mission
to keep people alive."
Nontreatment more accurately describes hospice whose "tranquil normality" of death was recounted by another doctor of
death at yet another hospice:
When an ulcerated artery begins hemorrhaging, the patient is not given transfusions....Instead, he is covered
with a blanket so he won't be frightened at the sight of his own blood, and he is administered a sedative while someone sits
close and holds his hand.
The only place that is bigger on hand-holding than the hospice is the abortion mill, only they hold the hands of the
survivors, not the victims.
Now that we know what hospice doesn't do: try to save your life, it's time for a few words about why. Actually, one word
will do: money.
As the administrator of a local Virginia hospice confesses in an article tellingly titled "The Hospice Equation," "it
is the cost-savings that makes the dramatic case for support of hospice." No wonder Jane Stein, editor of Business and
Health, reports, "Employers are including these benefits because they are cost-effective."
"Benefits" to whom? Not to the victims of checkbook euthanasia, for whom cost-cutting is care-cutting and care-cutting
means grave-digging.
As "The Hospice Equation" sums it up:
Recent studies provide evidence that a properly structured hospice benefit can result in lower cost. Specifically, cost
savings are possible to the extent that a hospice system of care--including both home and inpatient care--substitutes for
the traditional system of hospital intensive care.
"Those electing hospice care," the pro-euthanasia think tank, the Hastings Center, confirms, "would have to waive the right
to other potentially life-prolonging services."
Death is, of course, the ultimate economy.God, however, has a different accounting. "The path of life is above for the
wise," His Word reminds us, "that he may decline from the lowest hell."
May the God Who gave you life grant you the wisdom to defend it.
Mr. Appleby is director of Citizens United Resisting Euthanasia (CURE), 303 Truman Stephen St., Berkeley Springs,
WV 25411, 304-258-LIFE. The preceding article was prepared by CURE and Morgan County (WV) Prolife as a leaflet for distribution
at churches and other public places, especially those where hospice propaganda has been disseminated.
The Eternal Call, Winter 1991
