Ontario hospital threatened over Baby Joseph

LONDON, Ont. -- The London hospital at the centre of a growing dispute over a terminally ill baby has beefed up security after threats made by phone and email.
The threats have been passed on to police, London Health Sciences Centre administrators said in a news release Saturday.
“We have urged our staff and physicians to report to us any concerns they have," said LHSC CEO Bonnie Adamson in a news release. "We are working closely with police in London and elsewhere and have taken the necessary steps to protect our staff and physicians and ensure that the highest quality care at LHSC continues without interruption in a safe and secure environment.”
The hospital would not comment on the nature or number of threats, or what security measures have been taken.
No individual has received a direct threat, London police Deputy Chief Ian Peer said.
"But frankly, would I be surprised if that happens? Not really," he said.
Police are investigating some of the threats to the hospital, which are serious enough they could break the law, he confirmed.
It's no surprise to police, given the emotions of the case, the media attention and the Internet, that people are making threatening statements, Peer said.
"People on the Internet tend to be quite emboldened when they don't have to leave their names or addresses. It is an emotional issue and emotions run high."
Many of the threatening comments have come from the U.S., Peer said.
"South of the border people seem to be quite emotional and happy to share their opinions."
Peer gave credit to the hospital and the family's lawyer, Mark Handelman, for focusing their attention on the baby, thirteen-month-old Joseph Maraachli.
Baby Joseph, who is from Windsor, Ont., has been on life support at LHSC since October.
He has a neurodegenerative disease that doctors there say has left him in a vegetative state.
His parents disagree. They want doctors to fit Joseph with a tracheotomy so they can take him home as they did their baby daughter Zina eight years ago. She had a similar condition and died six months after the family took her home.
But London doctors have received the backing of Ontario's Consent and Capacity board and a London, Ont., judge who last week agreed with their position. Because Joseph's parents would not consent to ending life support, the hospital has now taken the issue to Ontario's Public Guardian.
The family hoped a Detroit, MI., hospital would accept Joseph as a patient and take a different approach than doctors in London, Ont., but the facility did not take the baby.
www.torontosun.com/…/17426206.html

LONDON, Ontario, February 24, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Dying one-year-old Joseph Maraachli’s family says two new videos of him flailing and reacting to tickling belie his hospital’s claim that he is in a permanent vegetative state. The video of Joseph being tickled, which was shot Sunday evening only hours before the hospital had planned to remove his life support, also shows Joseph’s hands tied down - a measure the hospital took after Joseph removed the tube from his throat on at least two separate occasions. “How can a baby be in a vegetative state who has his hands tied - as we speak - for him to not pull out his tube?” asked Joseph’s aunt, Samar Nader. “How does a baby in a vegetative state respond to combing or tickling?” “What really boggles my mind is how we’re not allowed to videotape him or have media outlets watching him to show the public what he’s like,” she added. “That’s very frustrating.” The family took Victoria Hospital in London to court last week to prevent them from removing his life support against their wishes, but Ontario Superior Court Justice Helen Rady sided with the hospital. Her decision was based on doctors’ testimony that he is in a permanent vegetative state with no brain stem reflex. But family members question the doctors’ judgment, saying Joseph is fully responsive to touch, particularly that he hates being touched by cold hands, tickles easily, and moves his head when his hair is brushed. They also say he responds to loud noises by turning his head toward the sound. Sam Sansalone, a spokesman for the family, says the fact that the hospital has had to tie his hands down shows “how absurd” the claim is that Joseph is in a vegetative state. “How could a supposedly persistent vegetative state child have so many occasions of purposeful neuromuscular movements of yanking out their uncomfortable air tube, so many times that hospital staff would have to tie his hands to prevent further episodes?” he asked. Sansalone also says that hospital staff failed to note the tube removals in his chart. Joseph suffers from a severe neurological disorder, but his specific condition remains undiagnosed. Doctors have given him no chance of recovery, so his parents, Moe Maraachli and Sana Nader, have asked them to perform a tracheotomy which would enable him to breathe on his own, so that they could take him home. The doctors have refused, saying the procedure is too risky. Their daughter died from similar complications eight years ago, but in that case doctors performed a tracheotomy and they were able to take her home. In January, the Consent and Capacity Board of Ontario sided with the hospital, a decision backed up by Justice Rady last Thursday. The hospital appeared set to remove Joseph’s life support on Monday at 10 a.m., but that got delayed when the family hired expert lawyer Mark Handelman over the weekend with the financial support of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition. To make a donation to cover the legal costs please click here. The family has been trying to have Joseph transferred to a hospital in the U.S., where they believe he’ll get better care or at least a reassessment, and possibly the tracheotomy they need to bring him home. The family has expressed concerns that hospital security is following them around and denying them private visitations with Joseph. On Tuesday, Children’s Hospital of Michigan in Detroit, where the family had hoped to have Joseph transferred, refused to take him despite previous assurances that they would. The family says, however, that they are far from out of options. The clock is ticking for the family as Joseph’s current hospital has asked Ontario’s Office of the Public Guardian to assume decision-making power after the family refused to have Joseph’s life support removed on Monday. The public guardian could order it removed at any point. Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, warned in a Fox news interview that the court decision facilitates a system where doctors are authorized to force life and death decisions on patients. He has said he believes it is far worse than the “death panels” recently debated in the U.S. as part of the federal health care law. He emphasized to LifeSiteNews last week that the family isn’t pushing for extraordinary treatment, just asking to care for their dying child at home. “They’re arguing that the best way to do that is by doing a tracheotomy so the child can somewhat breathe on his own and care for him while he’s dying,” he explained. “It’s the hospitals and the doctors once again usurping their power over the people,” he said. “That’s what’s happening. And they have significant power - they have the money and the courts behind them. It’s absolutely ridiculous.” Over 9,000 people have rallied behind the parents through the Facebook page “Save baby Joseph”. www.lifesitenews.com/news/exclusive-video…