The first condition that would permit parents to allow their newborns to die is when there is negligible chance for growth and development. Normally, newborns are dependent on their parents for a short period during their childhood. In this view, parents have the responsibility of taking care of their children as they grow and develop until they reach adulthood. In the aspect of medical intervention, parents have the responsibility of making decisions, which promote the growth and development of their newborns.
However, when newborns have a negligible chance of growth and development, it is moral for parents to let them die. When there is negligible chance of growth and development, it means that newborns would be fully dependent on their parents throughout their lifespan and would live a poor quality life.
The second condition that would permit parents to allow their newborns to die is when there is a chance of great and continued suffering. Given that medical interventions aim to alleviate suffering, it is immoral for parents to employ futile medical interventions, which do not alleviate the suffering that their newborns undergo. In essence, parents should not compel their newborns to grow and develop while enduring pain and suffering. The third condition that would permit parents to allow their newborns to die is when the cost of treatment in very huge. The cost of treating newborns with abnormalities is enormous and places huge economic burden on parents.
When the cost of treating newborns is very huge, parents exhaust their resources and become impoverished, hence, making the lives of their children become burdens rather than gifts. Therefore, it is moral for parents to allow newborns to die rather than incur huge cost in maintaining their lives.
Ashley Treatment
Analysis of the cases shows that the case of Charley is morally the same as that of Ashley. The first feature that makes the two cases morally similar is that both Charley and Ashley had degenerative brain damage, which prevented them from growing and developing into adulthood with the ability to perform activities of daily living. The degenerative brain damage means that Charley and Ashley did not grow and develop because they maintained infantile stature in terms of physical and mental aspects.
The second feature that makes two cases morally similar is the reasons that parents gave when they requested for certain treatment regime. The parents of Charley and Ashley argue that their children require growth attenuation therapy, hysterectomy, mastectomy, and appendectomy to improve quality of their lives and ease burden of caring. Growth attenuation therapy stagnated growth of Charley and Ashley and made them maintain the size of infants and hysterectomy prevented them from experiencing excessive bleeding, enduring menstrual cramps, and saved them from possible sexual abuse. Mastectomy and appendectomy eliminated discomfort associated with their sedentary posture.
Given that the cases of Ashley and Charley are similar morally, it implies that Charley was permissible to undergo ‘Ashley Treatment’. Charley had considerable brain damage, which prevented her from growing and developing into adulthood as a normal person. In this view, parents requested for ‘Ashley Treatment’ with a view of improving the quality of life of their child. Without growth attenuation therapy, conditions of Charley would have deteriorated because she would have grown and become too heavy for caregivers and her mobility. Hysterectomy prevented her from heavy bleeding during menses and saved her from possible sexual abuse.
Mastectomy improved comfort and reduced the risk of breast cancer, whereas appendectomy alleviated intestinal discomfort associated with sedentary life and prevented the occurrence of appendicitis. Overall, ‘Ashley Treatment’ was permissible to Charley because it improved quality of her life significantly.