I have just been helping a private student gather information on the Eluana Englaro case and the fact that she had been set this task is an indication, I think, that this heartbreaking yet very political story is not going to drop out of the Italian headlines any time soon. I am aware that the background to the story, and Eluana’s death, have been reported in Britain but for those of you who do not know of it the situation is as follows:
Eluana was left in a persistent vegetative state following a car accident in 1992, when she was 19. After 9 years, her father asked for her feeding tube to be removed so that she could die naturally, a request which was denied by two courts. In July 2008 the Milan Court of Appeal decided that Eluana’s father had the right to have the tube removed. This decision turned very much upon the fact that Eluana had apparently stated that she would not wish to be kept alive in such circumstances. There was an immediate outcry from the political Right and the Catholic Church. The nation was said to be split more or less fifty-fifty over what would be the moral and humane course of action. Then the Italian Parliament took the case to the Cassazione, the Final Court of Appeal, on the grounds that the Milan Court ruling would change existing legislation. The appeal was rejected. In November the High Court stated definitively that Eluana’s father could have the tube removed, again to resounding criticism from the Vatican. Prime Minister Berlusconi then issued a decree which would have forced doctors to continue treatment. However, President Napolitano refused to sign it. Eluana had by then been moved to a private hospital in Udine to have the feeding stopped and there she sadly died, earlier than expected, on February 9th, just as Parliament was debating new legislation based on the Berlusconi decree.
Since then, all sorts of outrageous allegations have been flying around, the Pope has referred to the case indirectly and the country continues to discuss it. This article from the British journal The Economist concludes that the situation shows us two aspects of modern Italy: Berlusconi’s attitude to the judiciary and the considerable power of the Catholic Church.
My own conclusions would be slightly different: Firstly, whatever Berlusconi’s political motives might have been , he is a right-wing Catholic and we must expect him to react as such. Pointing to shortcomings in his private life would only provoke the reaction, “What has that got to do with it?” here. Secondly, although I am not a Catholic – indeed, I am not anything that I can define for you with regard to religion – I do see the Catholic Church as a safeguard in cases like this. Thirdly, the fact that nearly 50% of those polled thought that Eluana should have been allowed to die naturally shows that attitudes are changing, for this would not have been the result even a decade ago. And finally, from my discussions over the past week or so I would say that Italy is very much a country that still believes in miracles. Sometimes they do happen and perhaps, for Eluana, there was one on February 9th.
Eluana was left in a persistent vegetative state following a car accident in 1992, when she was 19. After 9 years, her father asked for her feeding tube to be removed so that she could die naturally, a request which was denied by two courts. In July 2008 the Milan Court of Appeal decided that Eluana’s father had the right to have the tube removed. This decision turned very much upon the fact that Eluana had apparently stated that she would not wish to be kept alive in such circumstances. There was an immediate outcry from the political Right and the Catholic Church. The nation was said to be split more or less fifty-fifty over what would be the moral and humane course of action. Then the Italian Parliament took the case to the Cassazione, the Final Court of Appeal, on the grounds that the Milan Court ruling would change existing legislation. The appeal was rejected. In November the High Court stated definitively that Eluana’s father could have the tube removed, again to resounding criticism from the Vatican. Prime Minister Berlusconi then issued a decree which would have forced doctors to continue treatment. However, President Napolitano refused to sign it. Eluana had by then been moved to a private hospital in Udine to have the feeding stopped and there she sadly died, earlier than expected, on February 9th, just as Parliament was debating new legislation based on the Berlusconi decree.
Since then, all sorts of outrageous allegations have been flying around, the Pope has referred to the case indirectly and the country continues to discuss it. This article from the British journal The Economist concludes that the situation shows us two aspects of modern Italy: Berlusconi’s attitude to the judiciary and the considerable power of the Catholic Church.
My own conclusions would be slightly different: Firstly, whatever Berlusconi’s political motives might have been , he is a right-wing Catholic and we must expect him to react as such. Pointing to shortcomings in his private life would only provoke the reaction, “What has that got to do with it?” here. Secondly, although I am not a Catholic – indeed, I am not anything that I can define for you with regard to religion – I do see the Catholic Church as a safeguard in cases like this. Thirdly, the fact that nearly 50% of those polled thought that Eluana should have been allowed to die naturally shows that attitudes are changing, for this would not have been the result even a decade ago. And finally, from my discussions over the past week or so I would say that Italy is very much a country that still believes in miracles. Sometimes they do happen and perhaps, for Eluana, there was one on February 9th.
