Suing a Cancer Patient's Parents

Virginia tries to force chemotherapy on a boy with Hodgkin's disease after he and his parents opt for an alternative herbal treatment.

Should parents be able to choose whatever cancer treatment they feel is best for their child, even if it's not proven to work? The answer is no according to federal and state laws that say parents must choose a treatment that's proven, or be charged with neglect.

Sometimes this doesn't seem right. Especially when you hear the story of Michael and Raphaele Horwin, who acquiesced to demands that they treat their 2-year-old son Alexander with chemotherapy for brain cancer. Only after Alexander died did they find out that a clinical trial testing that very same treatment in children was halted because it accelerated the spread of brain tumors.

But another case described by Art Caplan, head of the University of Pennsylvania Center for Bioethics, in his latest MSNBC column is altogether different. A 16-year-old boy named Abraham suffering from Hodgkin's disease went through chemotherapy once, but the cancer came back. He refused to go through the treatment again and instead began an alternative treatment: Abraham's dad brews herbs including licorice and red clover, and he and his wife offer spiritual prayers while their son drinks the concoction four times a day. Now the state of Virginia is taking his parents to court to force conventional treatment on him. Why is it the state's business what cancer treatment a boy and his parents choose?

According to Caplan:

There are two simple reasons. Standard medical treatment for the kind of cancer he has works. And Abraham, for all his apparent sophistication and thoughtfulness, is still a kid.

Cancer doctors at my medical school, the University of Pennsylvania, tell me that, supplemented with radiation, the cure rate for Abraham's cancer is between 85 and 90 percent after three rounds of chemo. This is one of the most curable of cancers - not one to try to fix with licorice root.

True, the young man has been through the treatment and hated it. But he and his parents have talked themselves into believing that a screwball regimen from a Tijuana clinic is just as likely to save his life. It isn't.

Do Abraham or his parents get the last word versus the state? Not when his life hangs in the balance.

Even if the court orders Abraham to undergo chemotherapy, Caplan doubts the boy will be handcuffed and escorted to the hospital. Still, he thinks the state should win the case to hopefully talk sense into the parents. link