Doctors, the oaths of Hippocrates and Maimonides and executions

Taken from an op-ed by Charles van der Horst, M.D., professor of medicine at UNC-Chapel Hill.

After North Carolina switched from hanging to electrocution to kill its prisoners, the legislature enacted regulations beginning in 1909 requiring that "at such execution there shall be present ... the surgeon or physician of the penitentiary" to "certify the fact of the execution of the condemned prisoner."

In more recent history, the U.S. Supreme Court has limited who can be executed, citing the Eighth Amendment against "cruel and unusual punishment." Because other methods of execution are messy, lethal injection is now the preferred method. To be certain that this method is used correctly, many courts have decided that physicians must be available not only to pronounce the prisoner dead but also to assure proper procedure: that the intravenous lines are in place, that the correct doses of appropriate drugs are given and that the prisoner is actually dead.

[...]In April 2006, a group of physicians pointed out to the N.C. Medical Board that physicians participating in executions were doing much more than simply observing -- behavior that, in our opinion, was contrary to American Medical Association ethical guidelines as well as to the oaths of Hippocrates and Maimonides that physicians take upon graduation from medical school. (For example: "I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. ... Whatever houses I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the sick" -- Hippocrates.)

The Medical Board subsequently adopted a policy in January 2007 stating that "any physician who engages in any verbal or physical activity ... that facilitates the execution may be subject to disciplinary action by this Board."

[...]Last week, however, the state Supreme Court ruled that the Medical Board cannot punish physicians who violate their sacred oaths.

As a physician, life is relatively simple for me. I face complicated diagnostic dilemmas on a daily basis and sleepless nights worrying about my patients. What I don't worry about is whether my patient has insurance, is an illegal alien or even possibly a murderer. I do not have to like him; I simply have to take care of him the best way I can.

When a physician attending an execution finds that the prisoner is not dead, what should the doctor do -- resuscitate the prisoner or finish the job?
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