Top Stories of 2003: Terri Schiavo 'Miracle' in Florida Restores Father's Belief in God
by Jody Brown and Bill Fancher
December 31, 2003
(AgapePress) - In Florida, Terri Schiavo is receiving fluids again today after doctors were ordered to reinsert her feeding tube following legislative flurry and gubernatorial intervention on her behalf. But the lawyer for her husband says the woman's personal rights are being trampled on."Terri's Law," as the measure is known, was passed by the Florida House on Monday evening, then passed by the state Senate and signed into law by Governor Jeb Bush on Tuesday. The law places a moratorium on the removal of food and water from those patients who did not have an advance written directive and only in cases where members of the patient's family cannot agree on the appropriate medical care.
Terri Schiavo's case fits the criteria for the new law. And the 39-year-old woman, who suffers from brain damage suffered in a fall in the early 1990s, became the first beneficiary of that statute -- as well as the beneficiary of the efforts of thousands of pro-life supporters across the nation who contacted Florida legislators on her behalf.
The hospital into which Schiavo has now been moved is not releasing any details about her condition. But her brother, Bob Schindler, Jr., told NBC today she has an "incredible will to live" and looked "amazingly well" yesterday despite days with nourishment. It had been almost a week since her feeding tube was removed under a court order sought by her husband, Michael, who maintains she would rather die than be kept alive artificially.
Michael Schiavo's attorney, George Felos, also appeared on NBC's Today show on Wednesday. He said Terri was "abducted from her deathbed" and that her personal rights and dignity are being trampled on. He also said the woman was suffering signs of organ failure yesterday, and that the reintroduction of fluids in her system after a week without food or water could just make her suffer more.
But her parents, who have fought for years to keep their daughter alive, say Terri could still recover. Schiavo's father says the actions by Governor Bush and the state legislature to stop his daughter's forced starvation have restored his belief in God. Her sister, reacting to the development, called it "a miracle, an absolute miracle."
Joni Joins In
A Christian activist for the disabled is applauding the steps being taken to save Terri Schiavo's life. Joni Eareckson Tada, a quadriplegic herself since a diving accident in 1967, denies that Schiavo is comatose or in a vegetative state.
"The national news media reports her as being in a persistent, vegetative state, or a coma, brain-dead, terminally ill -- none of these are true," Tada says. "She is mentally incapacitated, she is disabled -- and under Florida state law, she has the right to rehabilitation therapy, to humane treatment, and to due process under the 14th Amendment. This woman, as a disabled woman, has rights."
Tada describes the Schiavo case as an "abhorrent" action to strip rights from persons with disabilities. And she says Schiavo's husband, who wants to let her die, cannot prove that that is what his wife wants.
"His comments are simply that: a comment. There is no written documentation," Tada tells Associated Press. "If a mentally competent person wanted to forego a feeding tube, then that would be thoroughly documented; it would be notarized, a doctor would review it carefully. Terri Schiavo never had that opportunity."
According to AP, Schiavo never signed a living will, which lets people exercise their right to die should they become comatose.
