The Morning News- Ashley

On the BBC World Service this morning, the debate revolved around the question of ethics in regards to the case of the parents of a girl with static encephalopathy in Seattle opting to have their daughter's growth stunted. They did this by giving her a hysterectomy and removing the growth buds from her breasts in a procedure called "growth attenuation." The little girl, Ashley, is 9 years old while the operations were performed on her when she was only 6. It is just now that the case is becoming widely publised because of a recent article in a medical journal that has received media attention.

The parents of Ashley, whom are unnamed, say that the procedure was done in order to keep her at 65 pounds and 4'5 feet tall, a weight and height which is manageable for her parents to handle since Ashley cannot move herself. Static encephalopathy is a severe brain impairment which prevents Ashley from walking, talking, keeping her head up, rolling over and eating. If she had been able to develop in the proper manner, she would have grown to a normal weight and height.

The debate on the radio today was whether Ashley's parents had the right to perform these operations on their daughter in order to make their life more manageable. In order to defend their choice, the parents have kept a blog about their daughter's procedures on which they call her their "pillow angel," because she always stays where she is put, on a pillow. The BBC spoke with a father of a boy with cerebral palsy in Britain whom raised perhaps the more pertinent question in this debate over medical ethics- what is wrong with health care system in America that it would allow parents to go to such lengths? Ashley's parents could not afford any in home help for their daughter or further medical treatment, but why should they need to? For such a supposedly wealthy country like American, whom spends billions of dollars a year on weapons of mass destruction, could we really not find it in our budget to buy this family a hoist in order for them to see their daughter grow to maturity?