Malnutrition of elderly Scots is 'euthanasia'

Jul 30, 2010
Baptist Press

WASHINGTON (BP)--Government-run hospitals in Scotland are guilty of a "form of euthanasia" by malnutrition, a patients' organization leader has charged.

Jean Turner, executive director of the Scotland Patients Association (SPA), said hundreds of patients, especially the elderly, are undernourished in National Health Service (NHS) hospitals because of a lack of assistance from staff members, according to The Herald of Glasgow, Scotland.

About 50,000 patients die in a state of malnutrition each year at NHS facilities, according to one recent report.

"The SPA would call this a form of euthanasia to allow dehydration and malnutrition to develop due to lack of awareness, lack of staffing or carelessness," Turner said, according to The Herald's July 4 story. the rest