Friday, August 29, 2008

Oncologist Revokes Living Will

People in favor of euthanasia often support it "for others," without thinking about the end of their own lives, contends a cancer patient who changed her mind about life after she was diagnosed with her terminal disease.

Silvie Menard, a French oncologist and consultant at the Center of Experimental Oncology of the National Institute of Tumors in Milan, Italy, spoke of her change of perspective in a conference at the Rimini meeting organized by Communion and Liberation. The annual meeting is under way through Saturday.

She said she had arranged for a living will, but as soon as she discovered that she was ill with cancer, she changed her mind.

Menard, a specialist in the study of cancer and the new medicines to combat it, said that after years of work with gravely ill people, she was in favor of living wills. But when she discovered that she herself had a bone marrow tumor, her life "took on a different meaning."

"Since knowing that I am sick, I feel like living every instant of my life, precisely because I realize that it is the only one I have," she said.

To read this whole article written by Antonio Gaspari for Zenit, please click here.

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