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The Catholic Leader, March 22, 2020
www.catholicleader.com.auNews
CHARITIES should be included in the Austral-
ian Government’s plan to assist small business
and protect jobs at risk of a collapse from the
coronavirus pandemic, Catholic Social Services
Australia’s chief executive officer said.
Ursula Stephens said the nation needed “con-
crete measures” to support Australia’s economy,
which was being rocked by the rapid spread of
COVID-19, and that government support needed
to be extended to the charity sector.
While praising the Federal Government’s plan
to give $750 to families and individuals receiv-
ing welfare payments, including pensioners and
Newstart recipients, Dr Stephens said charities
also required cashflow to survive an economic
fallout.
“Giving charities and social services access to
cashflow support will provide greater certainty
around their business continuity at a time when
many regional and rural communities continue to
be affected by drought and bushfires,” she said.
Dr Stephens’ comments mirrored those of
Community Council of Australia chief execu-
tive officer David Crosbie, who said charities
employed more than 1.3 million Australians.
“Charities are often overlooked when it comes
to stimulus packages and economic incentives,
despite the fact that they turn over around $150
billion each year, contribute more than five per
cent to GDP, and employ 1.3 million Australians,
particularly in areas where business employment
options can be limited,” Mr Crosbie said.
“Already many charities are entering the
starvation cycle – we need to ensure they are
able to employ the staff they need now and into
the future.”
When it came to protecting Australia’s econ-
omy, CSSA said it supported the Government’s
plans but questioned the actions of stock market
traders who “have a responsibility to think care-
fully about their current actions and the harm
they are causing to public confidence”.
Dr Stephens said Australia was a resilient na-
tion and would see out the coronavirus the way it
had survived natural disasters.
“It is important that we remain calm and
ensure that our collective actions serve the com-
mon good,” she said.
– Emilie Ng
Catholic network says government must support
charity sector in coronavirus pandemic plans
‘Hopefully what has happened to my mum will be
a catalyst for change’, grieving daughter says
Family horrified by the
tragedy of mum’s death
By Marilyn Rodrigues
TWO South Australian women who
lost their fight to have their mother’s
feeding tube reinserted displayed
incredible courage and devotion, the
priest who has been supporting them
said.
But Fr Paul Crotty said their battle illustrated
a deadly risk to disabled elderly people.
The woman died in February aged 87 five
weeks after her nasogastric tube fell out.
Her daughters were her legal guardians for a
number of years before they were replaced with
a public guardian last year following a dispute
with the aged-care provider.
They said her strong Catholic beliefs meant
she would have wanted to be nourished and
hydrated until she was close to death, and that “it
wasn’t yet her time”.
But the Office of the Public Advocate refused
to replace it, saying that medical professionals
agreed the tube was becoming burdensome on
the woman who had advanced dementia, breast
cancer and was non-verbal.
In a letter to the family, the OPA said the tube
would not be reinstated because the patient was
in a “pre-terminal phase”.
“Treatments offered should not be those that
prolong her life which would only result in more
suffering,” the OPA said.
“Once her nasogastric tube came out it took
five weeks for our mum to die,” the eldest
daughter said.
“It was such an inhumane way to die and
against what she believed in, she wanted to be
fed and watered to the end.
“She always said where there’s life there’s
hope, and to sit there day by day and watch
your mum slowly die a little bit each day is just
horrific.”
Fr Crotty has known the family for 10 years
and regularly visited the elderly mother to pro-
vide pastoral care.
He agrees that the OPA acted with a lack of
consideration for her often-stated intention and
her Catholic beliefs.
“(The OPA) had a palliative care assessment
and a GP’s advice so they acted on that, but
without consideration of what the lady wished
and what members of the family intended to do,”
he said.
“What they wanted was not a matter of un-
necessarily prolonging life, it was a matter of
sustaining life and giving basic care to someone
who is sick,” he said.
“People need to die, but not from a lack of
food and water.
“This lady was not in a dying phase.
“She didn’t have extreme pain, her organs
weren’t shutting down, she wasn’t in a vegeta-
tive state, she was comfortable as she was.
“The two sisters’ ability to stand in the face of
defeat and still to battle on is really a testament
to what their mother stood for.”
Three out of the woman’s five children sup-
ported the re-insertion of her feeding tube.
The sisters urged the public advocate to rein-
state their mother’s tube, arguing it would be in
keeping with her Catholic faith.
But in a decision upheld by the state’s Civil
and Administrative Tribunal in January the OPA
declined.
Instead she was given a saline solution
through an intravenous drip.
Port Pirie Bishop Gregory O’Kelly, wrote to
the OPA on January 29 stating the Church’s po-
sition on the withdrawal of hydration or nutrition
for a patient with disabilities.
“Every dependent person in care has the right
to hydration and nutrition,” Bishop O’Kelly
wrote.
“To deny food or drink, no matter how it is
delivered, to such a person is to deny them ordi-
nary means for sustaining life.
“There is a difference between sustaining
the dying state and undertaking a deliberate
withdrawal of treatment in order to bring about
death.”
Fr Crotty said the three siblings’ actions indi-
cated the quality of their upbringing, “what their
mother and father have passed on to them”.
“It’s an incredible story of love and devotion
and commitment,” he said.
He said it was a “really distressing” prec-
edent that family members present in a loving
role were excluded from being a voice for their
mother.
“How many dementia patients are not going to
have that support there for them, that voice for
them to ensure they receive basic care until such
time as they’re in a terminal phase of a terminal
illness?” he asked.
University of Notre Dame Professor of
Bioethics Margaret Somerville said without suf-
ficient facts it was not possible to judge whether
or not the cessation of artificial feeding via a
nasogastric tube was an ethically acceptable
decision.
“These can be very difficult decisions with
respect to the right ethical path to take and each
case must be carefully and individually consid-
ered,” she said.
“What often causes great emotional trauma for
the patient’s family, as in this case, is the thought
of starving and dehydrating the patient to death,
however there is research that shows the hunger
and thirst mechanisms in our brains shut down
when we are dying.”
The woman’s daughter, a former nurse and
aged-care educator, told The Catholic Weekly
she was left traumatised by the way her mother’s
life ended and the fact that she and her sister
could not be her advocates.
“It was pretty gut-wrenching,” she said.
“You would think of how she looked after you
as a child and protected you, and now she’s in
that state where she’s vulnerable and needs help
but you are virtually silenced.
“Even though I knew what her religious
beliefs were, and Fr Paul tried and the bishop
supported us, it didn’t work.
“It scares me to think that we all may have our
religious beliefs and our faith but if we’re not
being heard when it really matters what hope do
we have?
“Five weeks is such a long time to go without
food, but love’s a powerful thing and so is faith
and I think that gave Mum a lot of strength,” her
daughter said.
“We slept in her room and we prayed with her
and had her anointed and tried to make the room
as serene as we could but it was a horrible death.
“We were told she had no quality of life, but
how could a doctor who only saw her a couple
of times judge her quality of life, how is that
gauged?
“We have an ageing population and we need
to get this right.
“Hopefully what has happened to my mum
will be a catalyst for change.”
This story first appeared in The Catholic
Weekly from Sydney archdiocese.
Pleas for help:
“It was such
an inhumane
way to die and
against what she
believed in, she
wanted to be
fed and watered
to the end.”
Inset: Father
Paul Crotty.