Vatican says food, water must be provided to vegetative patients

Published: 2007-09-14

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- In a brief document approved by Pope Benedict XVI, the Vatican said it was generally a moral obligation to provide food and water to patients in a vegetative state. Nutrition and hydration, even by artificial means, cannot simply be terminated because doctors have determined that a person will never recover consciousness, the Vatican said Sept. 14. Exceptions may occur when patients are unable to assimilate food and water or in the "rare" cases when nutrition and hydration become excessively burdensome for the patient, it said. The text was prepared by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in the form of a response to questions raised by the U.S. bishops' conference. It was signed by U.S. Cardinal William J. Levada, prefect of the doctrinal congregation, and approved by the pope before publication. The congregation's document strongly reaffirmed points made by Pope John Paul II in a landmark speech in 2004, when he said nutrition and hydration, even by "artificial" means such as feeding tubes, should generally be considered ordinary care and not extraordinary medical treatment.

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