Posted: Apr 03, 2020 12:45 pm
ronmcd wrote:Thommo wrote:Alan B wrote:There is a shortage of protective and treatment equipment for COVID-19 in the UK. NHS staff have been driven to make life or death decisions based on the avilability of equipment used for treatment: "Remove this ventilator from this 80 year old and give to this 30 year old (because we don't have any to spare)..."
Is that true?
It's true in some countries ahead of us on the curve, I don't believe it's the case in UK yet. It probably will be, hopefully for a very short period of time if at all.
Sure, that was my belief as well. I was curious because the post specified the NHS and I had not read that that had happened in the NHS so far, although it may well just be a matter of time.
In answer to the question in the OP, we charge people with murder when they commit murder, not to make political points. We make political points by campaigning for and voting for different people, causes or parties. The mere prospect of prosecution on such a basis is a chilling authoritarianism that I strongly oppose.
In cases of legal neglect, malpractice or fraud that leads to death we have laws that cover those, and those certainly apply (in the hypothetical) to NHS staff as well as politicians. We cannot buy into the hypothetical that NHS staff are never the ones to commit such crimes.