SHS a True International Community

I just did a little research on where SHS's 30,000 visits each month (and slowly going up) come from. Most, not surprisingly, come from the good ol' USA. But I am very gratified to learn that people come here literally from all over the world. In the last month, f0r example, 583 visits came from Australia. We had 86 visits from China, 31 from Argentina, 91 from South Africa, 163 from India, 2169 from Canada, and 1 from Kazakhstan. We had 12 visitors from Vietnam, 113 from Brazil, 9 from Nigeria, 205 from France, and 1 from Greenland. In fact, there are only about 20 countries in the world, most in sub Saharan Africa, from where we received no visitors in the last 30 days.

I am most pleased: Danke, gracias, arigato gozaimashita , merci, xie xie, thanks y'all.

University of Washington Medical School Teaches Futile Care Theory as if the Right to Refuse Wanted Life-Sustaining Treatment Already Exists

An intrepid reader sent me this on-line syllabus from a bioethics course at the University of Washington Medical School. I checked on the link protocol and the author Nancy Jecker, Ph.D presumes that the right to refuse wanted life-sustaining treatment already exists. From the syllabus:

While you will hear colleagues referring to particular cases or interventions as "futile", the technical meaning and moral weight of this term is not always appreciated. As you will make clinical decisions using futility as a criterion, it is important to be clear about the meaning of the concept.

Futilitarians often deny that Futile Care Theory is about money. They deny it is about ideology that presumes some lives not to be worth living. As the following quote shows, it is about both:

The goal of medicine is to help the sick. You have no obligation to offer treatments that do not benefit your patients. Futile interventions are ill advised because they often increase a patient's pain and discomfort in the final days and weeks of life, and because they can expend finite medical resources.

Although the ethical requirement to respect patient autonomy entitles a patient to choose from among medically acceptable treatment options (or to reject all options), it does not entitle patients to receive whatever treatments they ask for. Instead, the obligations of physicians are limited to offering treatments that are consistent with professional standards of care.

Realize that futilitarians are changing the fundamental purpose of medicine to suit their beliefs. One such fundamental purpose is to extend life if that is what the patient wants. Futile Care Theory arrogantly presumes the right to tell a patient and his or her family that their life isn't worth extending--which is to say, that it isn't the treatment being judged "futile," but the patient. And, it apparently presumes the right to censor information a patient or family need to make proper informed consent.

The futilitarians are acting as if they have already won this bioethical controversy. But their agenda is running into strong head winds. As failed attempts to impose medical futility in Texas--where there is a law explicitly permitting it--demonstrate, we the people are not going to just roll over and let ethics committees meeting behind closed doors decide when the time has come for their baby, grandma, or a spouse to die. The more public we make this fight, the better chance we have to stop this ad hoc health care rationing/medical discrimination in its tracks. After all, in this fight "choice" is on our side.

Fighting Back Against Biological Colonialism

Biological colonialism (as I call it) is a real and growing international problem, in which rich Westerners pay destitute people for kidneys, the use of their wombs, and potentially coming soon to a poor country in Asia or Africa, for eggs to do mass human cloning. I have reported on some of the devastating consequences to the lives of the exploited here at SHS.

Now the Philippines has struck an important blow against the practice by banning foreigners from receiving kidney transplants in the country. From the story:

Foreigners will be permanently banned from receiving kidneys for transplant in the Philippines to prevent the country from becoming a major Asian center in an already thriving black-market trade, health officials announced Tuesday.

Extensive kidney trading involving impoverished Filipinos and prisoners--who sell their organs for paltry sums to syndicates catering mostly to foreign clients--has been reported by the local media in recent years.

A temporary ban was recently imposed on kidney transplants involving foreigners. "Today, the Philippine government asserts its mandate to protect the poorest and most vulnerable sectors of our society," Health Secretary Francisco Duque said in announcing the ban.

Of course the key is enforcement and breaking up the graft that leads to biological colonialism. But this is a good start that should be emulated around the world.

HT: John B.

NHS Meltdown: The Implosion Continues

What is left of the NHS in the UK is continuing its awful meltdown. Now, the bureaucrats in charge intend radical surgery. From the story:

Scores of hospital departments such as maternity units and cancer clinics will be closed or merged across the country under plans for a radical shake-up of the NHS...

The plans, which appear to have been held back until after last week's local elections, will be released over the next four weeks by the nine Strategic Health Authorities in England. They include setting a local target of reducing the four-hour wait in A&E to two hours, setting up dedicated trauma centres and better co-ordination of out of hours services.

However, in many cases, the changes--which result from Lord Darzi's continuing review of the NHS--will lead to services provided by cottage and district hospitals being moved out of the area.

Needless to say, protests are expected over what looks to be a loss of local care for many conditions. And the moral of the story is that centralized health care simply does not work.

Washington State: Becoming Two-Faced About Suicide

Why is assisted suicide always treated as if life were lived in a vacuum? Case in point: The suicide statistics in Washington are, according to a newspaper report "terrifying," and yet, many newspapers editorially support legalizing assisted suicide--which at the very least sends a terribly mixed message to the despairing thinking of taking their own lives. From the story:

Suicide statistics are terrifying. In 2005, there were 32,637 reported suicide deaths in the United States - 822 of those were in Washington State. An estimated 19 million Americans suffer from depression. Depression, combined with certain conditions including anxiety, isolation, drug and/or alcohol use or abuse, physical or emotional illness, and feelings of hopelessness or desperation, increases the risk for suicide.

"Ninety percent of people who die by suicide actually have undiagnosed psychiatric disorders," said AFSP Executive Director Robert Gebbia. In addition to depression, those include bipolar disorder, eating disorders and substance abuse. Gebbia believes that by raising awareness through the Out of the Darkness event, the stigma associated with mental illness can be reduced and more people can be helped. "When someone has died by suicide, people think somehow it's the victim's fault," he said. "We don't agree with that. It is a complication of an illness, just the way things go wrong with the heart or liver. When people see it as a complication of illness, we can reduce the stigma."

I don't want to stigmatize anyone, but I do believe that societal disapproval of suicide saves lives. But placing the state's imprimatur on some suicides does the opposite--it says killing yourself can be the right thing to do. And that is like telling someone not to smoke, but if they do use filter cigarettes: It totally dilutes the message.

The story then presents valuable information on what to do if someone you know is suicidal:

All suicide threats and attempts must be taken seriously...
- Take the initiative to ask what is troubling them and persist to overcome any reluctance to talk about it.
- If professional help is indicated, the person you care about is more apt to follow such a recommendation if you have listened to him or her.
- Don't be afraid to ask whether he or she is considering suicide, or even if they have a particular plan or method in mind.
- Do not attempt to argue anyone out of suicide. Rather, let the person know you care and understand, that he or she is not alone, that suicidal feelings are temporary, that depression can be treated and that problems can be solved.
- Encourage the person to see a physician or mental health professional immediately. Go with them if necessary...
- If the above options are unavailable, call your local emergency number or the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK.

(Not applicable for residents of Oregon or Washington (if I 1000 passes) and the suicidal person has cancer or ALS. In such cases, get a doctor to prescribe them poison pills.)

SHS Funnies

A hate crime against a plant! Why Garfield was banned in Switzerland:

Proposition 71: The New Gilded Age

When the creators of Proposition 71 spent tens of millions buying a constitutional amendment in California to permit human cloning research, they promised CURES! CURES! CURES! And what are people spending hundreds of millions of dollars of borrowed money on? EXPENSIVE FANCY BUILDINGS! EXPENSIVE FANCY BUILDINGS EXPENSIVE FANCY BUILDINGS! From the story in today's San Francisco Chronicle:

The governing board of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine is expected to give final approval today to a package of grants that will prompt a construction boom at academic campuses throughout the state.

More than three-quarters of a billion dollars in laboratory construction will get under way as early as next month, seeded by $271 million in facilities grants made possible by the passage of Proposition 71.

And not a workable building designed by "The General," that prefab contractor, either. We are talking high end, expensive architect, all the add-ons, type buildings. Example:

At UCSF, planners had to figure out a way to shoehorn a stem cell research center into the space-constrained confines of their hilltop Parnassus Heights campus. So they tapped one of the world's top design firms, Rafael Viñoly Architects, which delivered a striking plan.

The Institute for Regeneration Medicine will be housed in a silver, terraced structure that snakes uphill along the winding curves of Medical Center Way - tucked behind the 16-story towers housing the campus' major research labs.

I would have hoped that at a time when California is literally drowning in a $20 billion in deficit, that some restraint would be shown. But who was I kidding? This is the kind of moral corruption, pigs-feeding-at-the-trough kind of excess that undermines the people's confidence in government and our ruling institutions.

Somebody ought to sue: Hint. Hint.

Texas Representative Garnet Coleman: Installed in Hall of Shame

I just did an entry on a new Texas futile care lawsuit involving a girl named Sabrina Murray who was apparently threatened with a futile care termination by a Houston hospital, resulting now in litigation. But I had to reserve this entry for a quote from the author of the futile care law, Garnet Coleman (D-Houston). Sabrina's parents believe that the attempt to deny her care was part of a plan to cover up medical malpractice. Of course, I can't take a position on that--although it is certainly not the first time such a scenario seemed possible--but this crass quote Coleman gave to the Houston Press about the matter:

State Representative Garnet Coleman, (D-Houston), who helped author the 1999 act, tends to agree with Fine. When asked if he thinks the law is sometimes used to bury malpractice, he says, "I would hope not, and that's why we have autopsies. I don't think that the law either encourages it and I don't think that it discourages it. As long as you've had an autopsy, then you would find out what was the cause of death and whether there was a medical error."

"That's why we have autopsies:" I thought I had heard it all. Of course, the reason for the autopsy might be Coleman's terrible law.

A New Futile Care Lawsuit: What the "Quality of Life Ethic" Hath Wrought

Texas is ground zero for Futile Care Theory because of its pernicious law that permits ethics committees to refuse wanted life-sustaining treatment over patient/family objections. Readers of SHS will recall that when such a decision is rendered, families have a mere 10 days to find alternative care, which can lead to desperate situations, as I have reported on several occasions.

Now there is a new case of a teenage girl named Sabrina Murray whose sinus surgery went terribly wrong, leaving her comatose. From the story in the Houston Press (proving once again that the "alternative" newspapers are doing the best journalism today):

Within about three days of the second surgery, [mother Beatrice] Lopez says, doctors "started talking about our options. And we started getting scared, because the options were not good."

Lopez and [step-father Brian] Murray say that doctors and hospital staff began pressuring them to withhold treatment and feeding, which would ultimately starve Sabrina to death. To the parents, this was unacceptable. They wanted their daughter to live. "I was very disappointed with the way Memorial Hermann handled things," Lopez says. "They put it out on the table that we were being selfish."

Murray and Lopez accuse the hospital staff, doctors and nurses of doing everything they could to try to end Sabrina's life during the ensuing six weeks, including:

- Refusing to implement simple procedures such as giving Sabrina feeding and breathing tubes that would have enabled the parents to take their daughter home and care for her themselves,

- Attempting to turn relatives and friends against Lopez and Murray by encouraging them to persuade the parents to withhold treatment, all the while violating federal privacy laws by discussing Sabrina's healthcare information,

- Entering two separate do-not-­resuscitate orders against her parents' wishes, and

- Threatening the family with convening the hospital's ethics committee, which under Texas law can overrule the family's wishes and withhold life-support treatment from a patient.

"It was like we were caught in a bad dream," says Murray. "We couldn't believe this was happening."

Happily--and rarely, since usually desperate families in Texas can't get another hospital to take the patient--a new doctor and hospital was found with positive results:

As Lopez and Murray saw it, the hospital and physicians that caused their daughter's condition were now trying to end her life. And it seemed like there was nothing they could do to stop it.

Terrified, Sabrina's parents called the nonprofit organization Texas Right to Life, which referred Lopez and Murray to an attorney. The parents were able to transfer Sabrina to Texas Children's Hospital, where Lopez says Martin received treatment that doctors at Memorial Hermann had refused to give, treatment that saved her life.

This is a long story but very important to read. Sabrina awakened and is now living with her disability and cared for by her parents. And while I can't take a position about this particular case, I can say I hear from such desperate families on a continuing basis from all over the country. Futile care needs to be stopped.

Post Script: Last session, the Texas Legislature was unable to rescind the state's futile care law--in part because of the wrongheaded opposition of the Texas Conference of Catholic Bishops--which I wrote about critically here. Hopefully this case, if the facts are verified in court, will convince the bishops that allowing doctors and ethics committees to impose their ethical views on families is wrong.

More to follow...

"The Dignity of Living Beings With Regard to Plants"

I found a linkable cite for the Swiss ethics committee report on the "dignity" of plants. So, I thought I'd put a few pithy quotes up that have not appeared in my discussion here at SHS about the study or in my Weekly Standard piece.

Sometimes materialistic Darwinists will state that there really are no species distinctions between humans and animals because we and they share a high number of genes. Whenever that argument has been made in the past, I have joked, "Well, if you really want to get reductionist, carrots are made up of carbon molecules and so are humans. Hence, there is no real distinction to be made between us." Well, the big brains in Switzerland have precisely adopted that "joke" as one of the bases for granting individual plants "dignity." From the report:

Some members were of the opinion that plants are not part of the moral community, because they do not satisfy the conditions for belonging to this community...A further group felt that there were particular situations in which people should refrain from something for the sake of a plant, unless there are sufficient grounds to the contrary. This opinion was justified either by arguing that plants strive after something, which should not be blocked without good reason, or that recent findings in natural science, such as the many commonalities between plants, animals and humans at molecular and cellular level, remove the reasons for excluding plants in principle from the moral community.

You have to be really big brained to take my jest seriously. But some on the committee take that very position. Unbelievable.

Most of the committee either believed that plants are sentient, or could not say that they are not:

The majority of the committee members at least do not rule out the possibility that plants are sentient, and that this is morally relevant. A minority of these members considers it probable that plants are sentient. Another minority assumes that the necessary conditions for the possibility of sentience are present in plants. The presence of these necessary conditions for sentience is considered to be morally relevant. Finally, a minority of the members excludes the possibility of plants having sentience, because in their view there are no good grounds for such an assumption.

Plants are living beings. But sentience means the ability to feel and experience sensation. Plants are not aware in this sense. They are not conscious and cannot by their natures be conscious.

Finally--and I find this very telling--the Swiss ethicists considered and rejected "theocentrism" (being part of God's creation as the root of dignity), "ratiocentrism" (the capacity to reason as the root of mattering for their own sake, e.g. personhood theory), "pathocentrism" (sentience as the basis for moral worth, an animal rights ideology), but did not consider "humancentrism," the idea that being human is what matters the most morally, regardless of the value we convey to other life forms on the planet. Hence, human exceptionalism was not even thought about. The utter rejection of the intrinsic and inherent value of human life against which I have been warning is spreading and does not bode well for the future of the human community and the achievement of universal human rights.

Plants Rights on the Air

My Weekly Standard piece, "The Silent Scream of the Asparagus," on plant "dignity" piece is getting a lot of attention. For those in the Cincinnati area who may care to listen, I will be doing the Bill Cunningham Show on WLW (AM 700) at 9:15 Pacific Time.

Fox Interview Moved up 10 Minutes

For anyone up this early and/or who cares, my interview on America's Newsroom on FNC about "plant rights" has been moved up ten minutes. I am mainlining coffee as I prepare--a plant product I might add--that not even the most utilitarian bioethicist would begrudge me.

Exercise Machine Trains Brain of Paralyzed Woman to Walk

There is hope everywhere for people with spinal cord injury. We have dealt with adult stem cells and spinal cord injury in print and here at SHS several times previously. But this is very interesting. A paralyzed woman who broke her neck in a trampoline accident has been retrained to walk. From the story:

After the accident in July 2006 Miss Sykes underwent a risky operation where doctors inserted screws to support the fracture in her neck.

She then had months of intensive rehabilitation in the spinal injuries centre at Pinderfields Hospital, Wakefield, West Yorks, which happened to be trying out a machine known as the Lokomat.

Firas Jamil, the director of the centre, said: "The Lokomat enables spinal injuries patients to move their legs in a pattern that is consistent with normal walking motions and can literally help them to train their brain to teach the body to move again." To her astonishment, four weeks after using this Swiss-made robotic treadmill, and five months after the accident, Miss Sykes was able to walk short distances using crutches.

Pretty remarkable. It reminds me of Dr. Edward Taub's Constrained Induced Movement Therapy in which stroke patients are retaught to use their paralyzed arms--a tremendous breakthrough that was almost stopped in its tracks by Alex Pachecho of PETA, whose notorious Silver Spring Monkey infiltration almost destroyed Taub's life and career.

Doing Fox News Tomorrow AM

I heard from FNC today about my "The Silent Scream of the Asparagus" Weekly Standard column. I am schedule to be interviewed tomorrow at 6:45 AM Pacific (yawn) Time.

In Light of "The Silent Scream of the Asperagus"

SHS readers will recall my piece in the Weekly Standard about the Swiss creating "dignity" for plants. I am sure the creators of this parody (Arrogant Worms--Carrot Juice is Murder") never thought their satire would be overtaken by actual events.

Oregon Assisted Suicide Not About Unbearable Suffering

When assisted suicide advocates try to sell the public on assisted suicide, they usually describe an eminently dying patient whose suffering cannot be palliated. But once it passes, we soon see that assisted suicide is used by people who have serious fears and concerns, but not untreatable pain.

This is certainly the pattern in Oregon. The Oregon state-published statistics are virtually useless as far as I am concerned, being primarily based on death doctor self reporting, many of whom have a close relationship with the assisted suicide advocacy group Compassion and Choices (formerly Hemlock Society), and the records are destroyed by the state so there can be no independent audit. But I think the reasons cited by patients for wanting a lethal prescription are probably accurate--particularly given the recent study--ignored by the media--that many patients receive assisted suicide while not experiencing significant symptoms. In any event, the AMA Medical News summarizes the reasons cited by patients in Oregon for wanting assisted suicide:

Why do patients use the law? Interviews done with prescribing physicians after patients died showed a variety of reasons for requesting physician-assisted suicide.
- 89.0% feared losing autonomy
- 86.6% were concerned about being less able to engage in enjoyable life activities
- 81.6% feared loss of dignity
- 58.2% feared loss of control of bodily functions
- 39.2% worried about becoming a burden on family, friends and caregivers
- 27.3% had inadequate pain control or had concerns about it
- 2.7% were concerned about financial implications of treatment

These are all important matters that deserve proper and compassionate interventions, not poison pills. But the idea that assisted suicide is about preventing agonizing death is just not true. It is about abandoning patients to serious fears and worries that can be--and often are--ameliorated with proper care.

In A Pandemic: Who Should Live and Who Should Die?

Doctors and bioethicists have been mulling how to triage care if the deep ecologists receive the deepest yearning of their hearts and the human race is stricken with a deadly pandemic. In such a case, priorities of care will have to be set, but there is cause for worry that the latest report exploring the issue is creating a "quality of life" value system. From the story:

The suggested list was compiled by a task force whose members come from prestigious universities, medical groups, the military and government agencies. They include the Department of Homeland Security, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services.

The proposed guidelines are designed to be a blueprint for hospitals "so that everybody will be thinking in the same way" when pandemic flu or another widespread health care disaster hits, said Dr. Asha Devereaux. She is a critical care specialist in San Diego and lead writer of the task force report. The idea is to try to make sure that scarce resources--including ventilators, medicine and doctors and nurses--are used in a uniform, objective way, task force members said.

I understand and appreciate the impetus, but the list itself is worrying:

Those out of luck are the people at high risk of death and a slim chance of long-term survival. But the recommendations get much more specific, and include:
- People older than 85.
- Those with severe trauma, which could include critical injuries from car crashes and shootings.
- Severely burned patients older than 60.
- Those with severe mental impairment, which could include advanced Alzheimer's disease.
- Those with a severe chronic disease, such as advanced heart failure, lung disease or poorly controlled diabetes.

Triage is designed to prioritize care when there is an acute shortage of resources. It creates a temporary priority line for treatment based on helping the most severely injured or ill who, with proper care, are likely to survive. Triage is definitely not rationing since the ultimate goal is to treat everyone.

It strikes me that the recommendation slips from the former into the latter. After all, who knows what the individual cases will look like if the worst befalls us. For example, if an 86-year-old presents with the illness but appears better able to survive it than a more seriously ill 30 year-old, it would appear that the triage principle would be violated under this recommendation by giving priority to the younger person based on age rather than actual physical conditions of the two patients. If so, this violates triage and amounts to age discrimination. Indeed, given that it would be all too easy to treat the guidelines as rigid rules during scarcity of health resources crises, they could be unintentionally dangerous.

A good and sincere try, but I think we can do better than this.

SHS Funnies

Why the transhumanist technological breakthrough--known as the "singularity"--will never come:


Lio proves there may be something to genetic determinism:

Alaska Governor Walks the Walk: Gives Birth to Down Baby

I don't like to comment about issues involving individual family matters, but this is an exception: Alaska Governor Sara Palin and her husband have welcomed a new baby with Down syndrome into the world. From the story:

The doctor's announcement in December, when Palin was four months pregnant, presented her with a possible life- and career-changing development. "I've never had problems with my other pregnancies, so I was shocked," said Palin, a mother of four other children. "It took a while to open up the book that the doctor gave me about children with Down syndrome, and a while to log on to the Web site and start reading facts about the situation."

The 44-year-old governor waited a few days before telling her husband, Todd, who was out of town, so she could understand what was ahead for them. Once her husband got the news, he told her: "We shouldn't be asking, 'Why us?' We should be saying, 'Well, why not us?'"

There was never any doubt the Palins would have the child, and on April 18 she gave birth to Trig Paxson Van Palin. "We've both been very vocal about being pro-life," Palin said. "We understand that every innocent life has wonderful potential."

This shouldn't be notable, but we live in an era where the societal expectation in such cases is increasingly for eugenic abortion, and indeed, currently 90 percent of babies in the West diagnosed prenatally with DS are not allowed to be born. How wonderful, then, that such a notable public figure and her husband could lead by example on this important moral issue. Let us all wish the happy parents and their new son Trig much happiness and joy in the coming years.

Why Does Our Government Keep Attacking Hospice?

Back during the Clinton Administration, federal bureaucrats launched a devastating assault on hospice--called "Operation Restore Trust"--in which the Feds presumed that a patient who did not die within 6 months of entering hospice was there fraudulently, and as a consequence, demanded tens of millions in refunds from hospice programs throughout the country. I was a hospice volunteer at the time and saw the devastating effect: My last patient, who was dying (and died) of ALS--was tossed out on his ear because he had unexpectedly survived 18 months. The chilling effect placed on the entire hospice movement by Operation Restore Trust continues to this day--along with the suffering it causes.

Well now, the government under President Bush is at it again: This time they seek to cut hospice payments under medicare by billions of dollars per year. From the advocacy plea by from the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization that seeks to prevent this undermining of a noble calling:

According to a recent MedPAC findings, the National Median Margin for hospices is 3.4% and with such a thin margin, a cut in rates will put undue pressure on providers of this high quality care.

Hospice programs rely on Medicare for a disproportionate share of their revenues,totaling 80-85%. Given the patient population that hospice serves, this is understandable, but cutting rates by billions of dollars would reduce the resources available to continue providing this necessary care.

Hospice is a cost effective and compassionate health care delivery system for the terminally ill. A recent independent Duke University study clearly demonstrated that on average, hospice saves Medicare more than $2,300 per patient and goes on to say, "Given that hospice has been widely demonstrated to improve quality of life of patients and family members…the Medicare program appears to have a rare situation whereby something that improves quality of life also appears to reduce costs."

Why go after hospice? Because it is politically weak. So why not save a few billion on the backs of dying people?

HT: Judy Dobson

"The Silent Scream of the Asparagus"

As promised, I have written a longer piece Switzerland embodying the "dignity" of plants into its constitution in a published in this week's Weekly Standard (subscription may be required). First, I recount the story and the ethics committee's report, as I did here at SHS earlier.

Then, I point out that "plant rights" is not really a laughing matter:

What is clear, however, is that Switzerland's enshrining of "plant dignity" is a symptom of a cultural disease that has infected Western civilization, causing us to lose the ability to think critically and distinguish serious from frivolous ethical concerns. It also reflects the triumph of a radical anthropomorphism that views elements of the natural world as morally equivalent to people.

Why is this happening? Our accelerating rejection of the Judeo-Christian world view, which upholds the unique dignity and moral worth of human beings, is driving us crazy. Once we knocked our species off its pedestal, it was only logical that we would come to see fauna and flora as entitled to rights.

I recount how the intellectual elites were the first to embrace "speciesism" as a concept and then recap some of the philosophies, ideologies and movements that embrace human unexceptionalism, such as personhood theory and animal rights. Even environmentalism, I point out, has picked up the virus:

Eschewing humans as the pinnacle of "creation" (to borrow the term used in the Swiss constitution) has caused environmentalism to mutate from conservationism--a concern to properly steward resources and protect pristine environs and endangered species--into a willingness to thwart human flourishing to "save the planet." Indeed, the most radical "deep ecologists" have grown so virulently misanthropic that Paul Watson, the head of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, called humans "the AIDS of the earth," requiring "radical invasive therapy" in order to reduce the population of the earth to under a billion.

Here is my conclusion:

One Swiss scientist quoted in the editorial worried that "plant dignity" provides "another tool for opponents to argue against any form of plant biotechnology" despite the hope it offers to improve crop yields and plant nutrition.

What folly. We live in a time of cornucopian abundance and plenty, yet countless human beings are malnourished, even starving. In the face of this cruel paradox, worry about the purported rights of plants is the true immorality.

We are disattaching ourselves from reason and will harm ourselves profoundly if we don't quickly turn this craziness around.