Terri Schiavo

Theresa Marie Schiavo [ ˈʃaɪvoʊ ] (born December 3, 1963 near Philadelphia , Pennsylvania , † March 31, 2005 in Pinellas Park , Florida ) - commonly known as Terri Schiavo or Terri Schindler-Schiavo - was an American from Saint Petersburg (Florida) who suffered severe brain damage caused by a lack of oxygen in a collapse and as a result remained in a vegetative state for 15 years from 1990 until her death .

She was the subject of a media-watched argument between her husband Michael Schiavo and parents Mary and Bob Schindler over the continuation of life support measures, which made her the focus of public debate on the issue.

Medical history

Terri Schiavo suffered from bulimia . Presumably as a result of this eating disorder , there was a potassium deficiency on February 25, 1990 , which caused a temporary cardiac arrest . Her brain was severely damaged by the insufficient supply of oxygen that occurred . she fell into a vegetative state ( Apallic syndrome ).

According to the attending physicians, it would no longer have been possible to wake Terri Schiavo out of this coma because the brain had suffered too much damage. The cerebral cortex (the cerebral cortex) is almost completely atrophied (disappeared). This was confirmed at the autopsy after her death . Thus, if the resumption of life-support measures had been enforced, she would have remained bedridden as a coma patient. The view taken by her parents that a cure or even significant improvement is possible was only shared by a few experts.

Schiavo's movements, which were interpreted by her parents as signs of consciousness, were explained by her doctors as vegetative reflexes, which were not an indication of remaining consciousness.

However, some German doctors who were interviewed by the media were of the opinion that she was not in a pure vegetative state, but in a status of minimal conscious activity.

Discussion about consequences

The husband accepted the doctors' diagnosis after initial attempts at treatment were unsuccessful. The parents, however, continued to hope that it might be possible to improve their daughter's condition. This different assessment resulted in a bitter dispute about the treatment of Schiavo: while the husband invoked Schiavo's often expressed wish not to be artificially kept alive in the event of an incurable disease, and he thus the treatment including the artificial Wanted to stop diet, the parents wanted to continue the treatment in any case, in order to be able to use every chance of healing.

Legal and political debate

The dispute between the two parties over the treatment was conducted for years in court and increasingly also through the media. Her husband had been in court in November 1992 for $ 1 million in damages for medical malpractice in treating her cardiac arrest; the parents Mary and Bob Schindler tried already then to end his guardianship in court, but failed on July 29, 1993. In May 1998, Terri Schiavo's husband Michael had applied for the first time for permission to remove the feeding tube. The parents appealed to the court. On April 26, 2001, artificial feeding was stopped by court order. The decision was reversed by another court two days later; resumed diet four days after cessation. In October 2003 the diet was stopped again by order of the judge. As a result, the Florida parliament quickly passed a law that gave Governor Jeb Bush the right to order artificial feeding. Bush made use of this right, so that the Schiavo diet was resumed after a few days.

In September 2004, however, this law was declared unconstitutional by the highest court in Florida. As a result, a judge decided in February 2005 to discontinue the artificial feeding again on March 18. Schiavo's parents sought to have that decision revoked through a variety of Florida and federal legal filings and political appeals. Despite the fact that the American President George W. Bush spoke out publicly for the concerns of the parents and the Republicans in the US House of Representatives passed a law on March 21 that expanded the possibilities of the parents to go to court, they could not get their way.

The feeding tube remained removed according to the decision. Terri Schiavo died 13 days later, on March 31, due to lack of water. In the last days of her life, she was given morphine to relieve pain that may have been caused by dehydration, as there is some debate as to whether or not persistent coma patients can still feel pain.

Schiavo's corpse was autopsied at the consent of her husband and parents in order to unequivocally clarify the extent of her brain damage. It was found that her brain was so badly damaged that no treatment could have improved her condition. According to forensic doctor Jon Thogmartin, the woman's brain weighed 615 grams, only about half of a normal human brain and thus significantly less than Karen Ann Quinlan's (835 grams), a frequently used comparative case. Terri Schiavo was blind and otherwise unable to perceive her surroundings. No signs of abuse were found. The exact cause of the original collapse could not be determined.

reception

Her husband's efforts to have Terri Schiavo shut down the automatic feeding system have sparked a controversial debate in the United States about bioethics , euthanasia , guardianship and human rights . In this context, the case is being used by many religious groups and some politicians in the USA for their own purposes, as demonstrated, for example, by the attempted interventions by the governor of Florida, Jeb Bush, or the statements made by the American president , who was in office in 2005 , who clearly revealed himself took the side of Schiavo's parents. What was actually a private matter gradually turned into a case of great public interest. The major newspapers in the country opened daily with the Schiavo case in August 2005; Television and radio broadcasts and, for the first time, forums on the Internet to a greater extent ensured an emotional debate about the ethics of dying, which further divided the country , which was polarized after the 2004 presidential election . The letters to the editor, which reflected the particularly strong media interest in 2003 and 2005, also showed an emotionalized language and - contrary to the results of opinion polls - tended to speak out against the termination of life-support measures, which reflects the great diversity of opinion and the need for differentiation.

The Schiavo case also attracted attention in Europe. In Germany was mainly a living will and the question of how the case would have been decided here may be discussed. Pope John Paul II spoke out in favor of maintaining Terri Schiavo's diet.

The case has also entered various debates in academia. In addition to medical ethics, legal and theological debates, the case was discussed in the sociological field of biopolitics and biotechnology . The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith of the Roman Catholic Church, in response to the 2007 case, wrote a document in response to the Catholic bishops of the United States that stipulates the correct handling of life-prolonging measures from the perspective of the Vatican.

Almost a decade after the debate, Jeb Bush's behavior at the time was brought up again when he entered the 2016 presidential campaign in December 2014 ; Schiavo's husband spoke out against his candidacy because of Bush's interference in Schiavo's personal freedom of choice and announced in February 2015 that he would be involved in the election campaign against Jeb Bush.

Trivia

• Terri Schiavo's illness was parodied in the 2005 animated series South Park and 2010 in Family Guy . In South Park, Kenny is run over by the car and falls into a similar coma. In Family Guy, Stewie's kindergarten features a musical about Terri Schiavo, in which Schiavo's husband Michael Schiavo visits his wife in the hospital. There a doctor decides to switch off the life support machines. Stewie takes on the role of the "plug" there.

literature

• Arthur L. Caplan: The Case of Terri Schiavo. Ethics at the End of Life. Prometheus, Amherst, NY 2006, ISBN 1-59102-398-X .
• Kenneth W. Goodman: The Case of Terri Schiavo. Ethics, Politics, and Death in the 21st Century. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2010, ISBN 978-0-19-539908-0 .

Web links

• Terri's Fight. Presentation of the Terri Schiavo case from the parents' point of view
• Erika Feyerabend: The "case" Terri Schiavo. Dying today: biopolitical and media-friendly. In: Analysis & Criticism . No. 494, April 15, 2005.

supporting documents

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Werner Heun : The Right to Die - Terri Schiavo, Assisted Suicide and their background in the USA. In: JuristenZeitung . Vol. 61, 2006, No. 9, pp. 425-431 (JSTOR access).
2. ^ Joseph J. Fins, Nicholas D. Schiff: The Afterlife of Terri Schiavo. In: The Hastings Center Report. Vol. 35, 2005, No. 4, p. 8 (JSTOR access).
3. ↑ Janice Hopkins Tanne: Web: Your Money Where Your Mouse Is. The Terri Schiavo Case Shows How The Internet Is Becoming A Battleground Over Ethical Issues. In: British Medical Journal . Vol. 330, 2005, No. 7494, p. 795 (JSTOR access).
4. ↑ Eric Racine, Marta Karczewska, Matthew Seidler, Rakesh Amaram, Judy Illes: How the Public Responded to the Schiavo Controversy. Evidence from Letters to Editors. In: Journal of Medical Ethics. Vol. 36, 2010, No. 9, pp. 571-573 (JSTOR access).
5. ^ So T. Koch: The Challenge of Terri Schiavo: Lessons for Bioethics. In: Journal of Medical Ethics. Vol. 31, 2005, No. 7, pp. 376-378 DA Merrell: Erring on the Side of Life: The Case of Terri Schiavo. (JSTOR access) In: Journal of Medical Ethics. Vol. 35, 2009, No. 5, pp. 323-325 (JSTOR access).
6. ^ ^{A b} Pádraig Corkery: Beyond the Terri Schiavo Case. In: The Furrow. Vol. 59, 2008, No. 2, pp. 67-76 (JSTOR access).
7. ↑ John Protevi: The Terri Schiavo case. Biopolitics, Biopower, and Privacy as Singularity. In: Rosi Braidotti, Claire Colebrook, Patrick Hanafin (eds.): Deleuze and Law. Forensic futures. Palgrave Macmillan, Houndmills 2009, ISBN 978-0-230-21017-2 (preprint; PDF) ; Sarah Hansen: Terri Schiavo and the Language of Biopolitics. In: International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics. Vol. 5, 2012, No. 1, pp. 91-112.
8. ↑ Barry R. Schaller: Understanding Bioethics and the Law. The Promises and Perils of the Brave New World of Biotechnology. Praeger, Westport, CT 2008, ISBN 978-0-275-99918-6 , chapter “Boundaries at the End of Life. The Strange Case of Terri Schiavo ”, pp. 159-164 (preview).
9. ↑ E.g. Scott Maxwell: Jeb Bush a 'Moderate'? Don't be silly. In: Orlando Sentinel , December 16, 2014.
10. ↑ Josh Israel: Terri Schiavo's Husband Speaks Out On Jeb Bush's Presidential Bid. ( Memento of the original of December 18, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Thinkprogress.org , December 17, 2014. 
11. ↑ Michael J. Mishak: Terri Schiavo's Husband Vows to Campaign Against Jeb Bush. In: Sun-Sentinel.com , February 15, 2015.