All the discussion about medical rights had me thinking....
Should terminally ill cancer victims who have failed to respond to all standard treatments for their condition have the right to be prescribed and administered drugs which are still undergoing pharmaceutical investigation and are not approved by the FDA for use? (Reference: New England Journal of Medicine, July 26, 2007, p. 408.)
As a note:
From the Associated Press August 7, 2007:
WASHINGTON - Terminally ill patients do not have a constitutional right to be treated with experimental drugs, even if they likely will be dead before the medicine is approved, a federal appeals court said Tuesday.
The ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit overturned last year's decision by a smaller panel of the same court, which held that terminally ill patients may not be denied access to potentially lifesaving drugs.
The full court disagreed, saying in an 8-2 ruling that it would not create a constitutional right for patients to assume "any level of risk" without regard to medical testing.
I think it's curious that nearly everyone has the constitutional right to smoke tobacco and drink alcohol and assume the risks that actually have been proven by medical testing, yet they cannot opt to have an unproven drug. A patient can choose to undergo the risks of surgery, even drastic surgery with a low probablity of survival....but they cannot choose to take medicine.
What do you think Joeuser?