The Otago Daily Times
March 12, 2002
Perhaps we should judge not, lest our grandchildren judge us
by Penny Jamieson (Bishop of Dunedin).
One of the wonderful aspects of living in the present is that we are always
right.
It has been distressing for us all to watch and, in some cases, be close to
parents who have been revisiting the death of a child, whether born or
unborn, whose heart was retained by Greenlane Hospital to assist in
identifying and treating infant heart disease.
Set against the high standards of patient information and consent that have
been established since the Cartwright inquiry in the late 1980s, the practice
of removing, without the consent of their parents, the hearts of children who
have died seems nothing short of sacrilegious.
The fact that these hearts have assisted in preserving the lives of other
babies impacts little on the sense of outrage. We have little sympathy these
days when institutions that we previously held in high regard are deemed to
have exploited the privileges which that regard endowed them with. We all,
and especially those who are most immediately concerned, feel that the trust
that we had placed in those institutions has been abused.
In many ways, a set of events like this seems like an unwanted intrusion from
a past generation into the present, almost as if we had suddenly found
ourselves boiling the copper in the laundry again. We are astonished and we
are appalled. And we react strongly. There have been some very strong
condemnations of the practice, and almost a sense of moral panic in the air
as people have rushed to make their 0800 calls and infant heart surgery is
suspended while the calls are dealt with.
Perhaps, we make these strong judgements on history so as to reinforce the
values that guide our lives at the present. In a time when all traditional
values are under scrutiny, there is perhaps an underlying public need to
grasp with some clarity at some values. We need to know that, even if doctors
cannot save our babies, the bodies of our babies will be honoured. And we
express this value by our abhorrence of the practice of doing otherwise.
It happens often. Perhaps the moral panic that Lynley Hood has recently
identified as a factor in the conviction of Peter Ellis in the Christchurch
Civic Creche child abuse case was an over-strong reaction to our unease about
some of the ways in which we have made childhood an opportunity for business.
Maybe the same observation could be made about the strength of the recent
outpouring of unease about comments made by the Governor General of Australia
- ill-judged and reeking of another age as they were. In all of these cases,
our unease has been well fuelled by an eager and somewhat prurient media.
I wonder, as values continue to shift through each new generation, how
history will judge us. Our grandchildren may well have the compassion to
understand that we meant well, but they will doubtless have difficulty in
approving much of what passes for regular practice at this time.
|