Did privacy law figure into newborn’s death?

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Did privacy law figure into newborn’s death?

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Fri, 07/28/2006 - 7:57pm.

I'll never understand the double-standard involved with health regulation, pregnancy, and minors.

You either let a minor decide their own course of health action (e.g. cancer treatment, pregnancy, et cetera) or you don't.

MSNBC: Did privacy law figure into newborn's death?

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. - Authorities said a 17-year-old girl facing a murder charge in the death of her newborn told lies and used privacy laws to hide her pregnancy from her parents, even as they tried to get medical attention for her.

The Fire Inside's blog
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Sad

Submitted by Sarah on Fri, 07/28/2006 - 8:15pm.

This is a tough one. I've thought of several things to write but each time I can see the other side of that perspective, or I see a loop hole that would be exploited. I don't know the answer.

Privacy Laws

Submitted by Crenshaw Sepulveda on Fri, 07/28/2006 - 9:55pm.

I don't know nothing from privacy laws. For the most part the laws seem good and valid. I know there are times when people will not act in their own best interest and their loved ones try to seek help that is not available because of privacy and other rights. I think, all too often, that people are damaged or worse by the application of the various privacy rights. I'm not wise enough to make the determinations of when a person's rights must be put aside to protect themselves, I only know that this must happen sometimes. I guess what I'm saying is that we are able to create great and wonderful laws in our society. Great monuments to rights are carved and yet we lack the wisdom and compassion to see when these rights are actually hurting the people they are erected to. We lack the provisions to make certain that people are not hurt in the protection of their rights.

"I would make it impossible for the covetous and avaricious to utterly impoverish the poor. The rich can take care of themselves."
^@^

Being realistic, a minor is

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Sat, 07/29/2006 - 8:06am.

Being realistic, a minor is not going to have the full amount of privacy as an adult.

Was the Constitution intended to be different for a minor? No, it wasn't. Then again, it also wasn't intended to limit free speech at all (No law shall be made) but most of society is perfectly content with certain limitations and adjustments (the same can be said for the Second Amendment).

So, here we are. A doctor would be held financially (if not criminally) responsible for failing to report to the parent(s) and going so far as to let the minor determine whether to notify the parent(s).

How does this make sense? How is pregnancy the single medical condition we have said, "Ok, you're 17. We're going to need a permission slip for you to watch an 'R' movie in class because the teacher could get in trouble, but if you're pregnant nobody has to know."

This is all I am saying: Either decide that a minor has full control over their health decisions or they don't.

If you think a minor can make a decision over a pregnancy, I don't see why you wouldn't think they can make a decision on the course of action they wish to take during cancer treatment.

Personally I think minors are underestimated today in their knowledge and capacity. Right now I'm 22, so 17 was not very long ago. I would have been flat out embarrassed if people had described me in the way they describe other minors. It's as if they're made out to be no more than lemmings.

"I am for free commerce with all nations, political connection with none, and little or no diplomatic establishment. And I am not for linking ourselves by new treaties with the quarrels of Europe, entering that field of slaughter to preserve their balance."

"Personally I think minors

Submitted by Phil Owen on Sat, 07/29/2006 - 9:21am.

"Personally I think minors are underestimated today in their knowledge and capacity."

Amen to that.

re: lemmings

Submitted by Meta Hogan on Sat, 07/29/2006 - 11:12am.

There is a misconception about lemmings, of which I was too recently disabused, that came directly from Disney fiction. Check this out.

MSNBC misses the point

Submitted by Jade on Sat, 07/29/2006 - 6:40pm.

I would say that SHAME figured into this newborn's death. We need to shift our culture so that young women aren't driven to murder rather than reveal a pregnancy. Leave it to the mass media to turn this into a political issue.

Poor kid.

Jade

(A Rose in the Pumpkin Patch)

We've missed you, Jade.

Submitted by Phil Owen on Sat, 07/29/2006 - 7:51pm.

We've missed you, Jade. There is very little that you say or write that doesn't floor me. Welcome back to the forum.

How was she driven by

Submitted by The Fire Inside on Sun, 07/30/2006 - 7:53am.

How was she driven by "shame?" Her parents hardly appear to be ultra-religious or the type who would have blown up had she come to them.

And really? You're telling me a 17-year old couldn't decide whether coming out with a pregnancy (let's assume the parents would have exploded) or dumping a baby in the shower was the better decision?

Don't put the word shame in quotations, TFI

Submitted by Jade on Wed, 08/02/2006 - 10:02am.

as if its some kind of leftist propaganda I am spreading. I don't know how you can possibly be denying that there is societal shaming of teenage parents. You aren't seriously calling that into question, are you???

It wasn't the girl's parents I was blaming. Note that my call was for cultural shift.

I have had total strangers say things to me like "babies shouldn't be having babies". (I am 24, but look younger.)

Human beings (especially women) are wired biologically and emotionally to love and protect our babies. In order for us to destroy them, something very powerful has to be at play. Its just not natural.

Did she know that murdering her baby was a worse decision ethically than coming out? Of course she did. But whatever pressures she was facing were so intense that she apparently felt she couldn't do it.

Did she make selfish decision? Obviously.But I feel sad that she was so desperate she was driven to this horrendous act. I have to wonder in these situations: what could be different that would prevent this kind of stuff from happening? We can't afford to be so simplistic as to just blame the perpetrator and call for the harshest punishment.

In order to address crime effectively, we have to be able to put ourselves in the shoes of the criminal.

Jade

(A Rose in the Pumpkin Patch)

Serious questions must be asked...

Submitted by DrewHendricks on Wed, 08/02/2006 - 11:28am.

"Human beings (especially women) are wired biologically and emotionally to love and protect our babies. In order for us to destroy them, something very powerful has to be at play. Its just not natural.

I agree ... and I have a painful question I'm going to ask.

(Survivors of child sexual abuse may wish to change channels now)

Who is the father? Is the father of her baby also the father of the mother? Was there something so shameful driving her actions that the Olympian and the authorities cannot even 'go there?' I don't know, I'm just asking. Like Jade said, it just is not normal for a woman to react to a baby this way.

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