From Booklist
Smith offers a conservative perspective on medical-ethics problems such as failure to provide subjects in research programs with understandable consent forms. He fears that current utilitarian ethicists will create--some have already done so, he says--a hierarchy of human life that would basically be a descendant of Hitlerian eugenics. Doctor-assisted suicide, he believes, must inevitably lead to such a development, and he takes readers step by step on a probable path to it, inspecting each landmark court case (Cruzan, Quinlan, et al.) along the way. He grudgingly concedes that some amelioration with controlled substances be allowed for patients suffering overwhelming pain, but he assumes that current uncontroversial pain control is more effective than many others say it is. On another major flashpoint of ethical dispute, Smith emphasizes the important benefits of research on animals. Furthermore, he makes suggestions for bringing bioethics back to what he feels is a proper philosophic and practical position, one conducive to safe and acceptable lives for both patient and doctor. William Beatty
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From Book News, Inc.
An attorney for the Anti-Euthanasia Task Force, Smith argues that American medicine is changing from a system based on the sanctity of life into a model in which the medically defenseless have not just the right but the duty to die. He cites many cases in which people recovered and survived after doctors had given up hope and threatened to cut off care for them.Book News, Inc.®, Portland, OR

FROM THE PUBLISHER

When his teenaged son Christopher, brain-damaged in an auto accident, developed a 106-degree fever following weeks of unconsciousness, John Campbell asked the attending physician for help. The doctor refused. Why bother? The boy's life was effectively over. Campbell refused to accept this verdict. He demanded treatment and threatened legal action. The doctor finally relented. With treatment, Christopher's temperature subsided almost immediately. Soon afterwards he regained consciousness and today he is learning to walk again.

This story is one of many Wesley J. Smith recounts in his groundbreaking new book, Culture of Death. Smith believes that American medicine "is changing from a system based on the sanctity of human life into a starkly utilitarian model in which the medically defenseless are seen as having not just a 'right' but a 'duty' to die." Going behind the current scenes of our health care system, he shows how doctors withdraw desired care based on Futile Care Theory rather than providing it as required by the Hippocratic Oath. And how "bioethicists" influence policy by considering questions such as whether organs may be harvested from the terminally ill and disabled.

This is a passionate, yet coolly reasoned book about the current crisis in medical ethics by an author who has made "the new thanatology" his consuming interest.

FROM THE CRITICS

Booknews

An attorney for the Anti-Euthanasia Task Force, Smith argues that American medicine is changing from a system based on the sanctity of life into a model in which the medically defenseless have not just the right but the duty to die. He cites many cases in which people recovered and survived after doctors had given up hope and threatened to cut off care for them. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Internet Book Watch

An obscure cadre of bioethcists has won legislation likely to change our daily lives: that's the contention of Wesley Smith's Culture of Death, a title which examines how the value of life is now traded on cost-benefit ratios. The issue here is equal protection rights and equal life values: this presents some important legal arguments in examining moral issues involved in new medical scenarios.

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING

C Everett Koop

Culture of Death promises to be a very major contribution to the discussion. — (C. Everett Koop, M.D., Sc.D)