Update on Woodstock Nursing Home Deaths – IL DPH Issues Report

blog recommendations, crime and punishment, homicide, media coverage, nursing homes, Our News & Commentary Blog, serial killers

Back in April, this blog featured two posts analyzing the disturbing and distorted coverage of an investigation of suspicious deaths at a nursing home in Woodstock, IL. The analysis can be accessed here (part 1) and here (part 2).

The story in brief: After a long investigation into suspicious deaths at a nursing home in Woodstock, IL, two women were charged with multiple crimes. Marty Himebaugh was charged with multiple counts of criminal neglect and single counts of obtaining morphine by fraud and unlawful distribution of a controlled substance. Penny Whitlock, Himebaugh’s supervisor, was charged with multiple count of neglect and two counts of obstruction justice. No homicide charges of any kind were laid against either woman.

Now that we’re in NY, we’re a little out of the loop when it comes to Illinois news. Thanks to Dick Sobsey at the ICAD blog, we now have more information – from a report issued by the IL Department of Public Health.

Here is one item lifted from the Chicago Tribune article on the report that is used as the basis for Dick Sobsey’s comments on the case:

The Department of Public Health report also refers to a 56-year-old man with Down syndrome who died in April 2006 and quotes a nurse telling a co-worker: “Those people aren’t meant to live that long. They are meant to die in their teens and I’m going to help him along.” (editor’s note – until reading this, we had no idea that one of the alleged victims was someone with Down syndrome.)

This comment, along with others in the report, leads Sobsey to assert – if the statements can be verified – that charges of murder or attempted murder should have been laid against Himebaugh.

Read his comments in their entirety at the ICAD blog.

In April, the posts here focussed on the language used in coverage – specifically the use of the term “mercy killings” used in press coverage to describe the alleged murders (which aren’t actually alleged at all in the criminal charges).

The Chicago Tribune was the only member of the media to abstain from use of the term. The Sun-Times was a repeat offender, but has dropped the term now that this report is out.

Charles Keeshan, of the Chicago Daily Herald, OTOH, seems reluctant to give up on the term, as indicated the lead sentence of his story published on September 24th:

A series of suspicious deaths at a McHenry County nursing home in 2006 may not have been mercy killings, but instead the work of a nurse overdosing patients she found troublesome or believed had lived long enough, according to state investigatory report. (Emphasis added.)

May not have been “mercy killings”????!!!!!

In fact, there was never any evidence that these were “mercy killings” at all – just a term that reporters seem to jump to when the suspected victims of murder are old, ill or disabled. And the report gives powerful evidence that this had nothing at all to do with mercy.

Here’s a flash – as reported earlier in this blog, researchers have studied the psyches and motives of nurses and other professionals who engage in multiple killings in medical settings – and it’s never about “compassion” or “mercy.”

Try reading, for example, “Angels of mercy: The dark side” in USA Today.

Or check out the recent research conducted by John Field – which I wrote about in an earlier entry here.

What those two sources will tell you is that serial killers in a medical settings are like serial killers elsewhere – cold, selfish people who aren’t thinking of anyone but themselves and their own twisted needs when they commit these crimes. –Stephen Drake

Followup on Caplan, Warnock and ABC

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Turns out the story ABC was doing on Warnock did run – and included part of Art Caplan’s remarks:

When Dr. Jonathan Groner, a surgeon and ethicist at Ohio State University, heard of a suggestion by a well-known British philosopher that those with dementia have a “duty to die” in order to minimize the burden they place on society and their families, he was troubled.

A few paragraphs later, they share the reactions of other players:

Groner is not alone in his opinion. Ethicists and Alzheimer’s advocacy groups alike are expressing outrage over Warnock’s comments last week, which echoed the opinion she put forth in an article she authored for a Norwegian periodical, titled “A Duty to Die?”

The article leaves the impression that the condemnation of Warnock’s statements are nearly universal in the bioethics community. Obviously, they didn’t talk to AJOB blog editor Summer Johnson.

It might be better, IMO, if the public was aware that there are ethicists in this country ready to defend this public policy proposal by Warnock. –Stephen Drake

Followup on Warnock – Art Caplan Strongly Disagrees With “Duty to Die”

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Art Caplan, Director of the University of Pennsylvania Center for Bioethics, dropped me a line to give me his reaction to Warnock’s comments about people with dementia. He gave these to a reporter at ABC but says they weren’t used in whatever coverage they ended up giving to Warnock:

No one has a duty to die. The notion that society should ‘expect’ someone to end their lives because they fear being a burden upon others is simply ethically repugnant. It is one thing for a person to decide that they do not want to accept medical care –and this decision may include considerations of their quality of life or even the economic consequences of their decision for those they love. There are patients today who refuse expensive cancer drugs knowing they will only get minimal benefit at a huge cost that will bankrupt their families. But individual decision-making should never ever be coerced or pressured by societal considerations–third parties or legislators–weighing in that it is best for them to die! Society must do
all that it can to provide the mean to efficacious medical care to all who want it. The Warnock view risks taking the frail and vulnerable and making them expendable–a position that no humane society can or should take.

In his note, he also said he was “shocked and saddened” by Warnock’s statements.

Unlike Caplan, I wasn’t shocked by Warnock’s statements. Other than that, I am pretty much in agreement with the sentiments expressed in the paragraph above. It would have been nice if ABC had used his remarks. –Stephen Drake

Bioethics Blog Defends Warnock’s Call for Killing of People with Dementia

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Last week, Baroness Warnock, a well-known “ethicist” who has advised the British Government on health care policy for ages, shocked advocates for the elderly in the UK when she suggested that people with dementia should be assisted in killing themselves or even outright killed. She suggested that the lives of these people are a “waste” and eat up valuable resources.

Her statements have drawn condemnation from just about every corner, including advocates for people with dementia and their families. Even the pro-euthanasia societies in the UK haven’t jumped to her defense. (OTOH, they haven’t condemned the remarks, either, so maybe they’re taking a “wait and see” in terms of public reaction before they take a public stand.)

Alex Schadenberg and Wesley Smith both have entries on Warnock’s comments you can read.

I guess I shouldn’t be all that shocked, but virtually alone, out of all the voices out there commenting on Warnock, Summer Johnson, PhD has done what even pro-euthanasia forces in the U.K. have been too timid to do – defend (and coming close to endorse) Warnock’s statements and her reasoning:

Some Brits are shocked at Baroness Mary Warnock’s latest quote regarding the significant burden placed on Alzheimer’s caregivers and her call for euthanasia for the demented.

The St. Louis Examiner reported that she said, “Elderly people with dementia are ‘wasting’ the lives of those who have to care for them.”

Not only are they wasting lives, says Warnock, but they are also wasting resources. Not exactly warm fuzzies from the Baroness. Yet, in a socialized health care system every dollar spent on one person is a dollar not spent on another. Thus, years spent in a demented state means that tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on a demented patient are not spent on essential preventive and life-saving services for children, young adults, and the middle-aged who have a chance of leading longer, healthy, fulfilling lives.

Thought about that way Warnock’s argument doesn’t seem so harsh. Is Baroness Warnock’s position cold-hearted? No. It’s practical. (Emphasis added.)

The Bioethics Blog is owned and operated by the editors of the American Journal of Bioethics, which is heavily loaded with bioethicists who work at or have ties to the Alden March Bioethics Institute (AMBI) in Albany, NY.

I want to personally thank Summer Johnson for firing a warning shot over the bow in terms of what kind of health care policy advocacy we can expect from the folks at AMBI. As a current resident of New York State, NY health care policy is a lot more personal for me than it used to be.

BTW, for those who might think that there’s something familiar about the sound of Albany and bioethics, NDY and CDR organized a visit to a conference organized by the group a couple years ago. Guess we could always visit them again sometime. –Stephen Drake

Addendum and Correction: Someone emailed me to let me know that neither Glenn McGee (former director of AMBI) nor Summer Johnson works at AMBI any more. McGee has officially transformed his Bioethics Education Network into a for-profit enterprise. I am guessing that is where Summer Johnson is working as well. To the extent that McGee’s enterprise is successful, there is good cause for concern for many of us who worry about the impact of certain bioethicists on policy makers – there is, after all, no way that policy makers have of distinguishing “good” ones from “bad” ones.

Painfully True Humor from The Onion

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Universal health coverage, like so many things those of us living below the median income line could use, is probably off the table now that we’ve got to figure out how to prevent total economic meltdown — in which we all get to pay for the bad behavior of rich people who operated in an environment bereft of any accountability for their actions. (The only good aspect of this whole thing right now seems to be the impending death of an irrational infatuation with deregulation that has dominated public policy for decades.)

What better time than to go to The Onion to remind us all what we’ll continue to live and die with thanks to having to bail out big investment houses on Wall Street:

DENVER—After years of battling crippling premiums and agonizing deductibles, local resident Michael Haige finally succumbed this week to the health insurance policy that had ravaged his adult life.

Haige, who had suffered from limited medical coverage for nearly a decade, passed away early Monday morning. According to sources, the 46-year-old was laid to rest at Fairplains cemetery, surrounded by friends, family members, and more than $300,000 of mounting debt.

“I miss Michael every single day, but at least he can finally rest now,” said Sheila Haige, who watched as insurance rates ate away at her husband over time. “What Michael went through, the humiliating forms, the invasive background checks, the complete loss of dignity and hope—I wouldn’t wish that kind of torture on anyone.”

The article continues…

According to an independent study released last month by the Mayo Clinic, health insurance is the nation’s No. 2 cause of death, claiming the lives of some 400,000 Americans each year. A silent killer, health insurance often strikes without warning, its harmful and profit-based policies avoiding detection until it is far too late. Although the cruel bureaucratic disorder does not discriminate, statistics have shown that senior citizens, young dependents, and those woefully underemployed are most at risk.

“I can’t tell you the number of patients I’ve had to deliver the bad news to over the years,” said Haige’s longtime family physician, Dr. Howard Silverman. “It’s never easy to look someone in the eye and tell them it’s going to have to be out-of-pocket. For most of these poor people, prayer is the only hope.”

If you enjoy reading humor that hits at some painful truths, read the whole thing here.