He is disabled (see post below). His parents got a ’stay of execution’ (so to speak) from having his ventilator removed in a medical system forced to ration. Anyone not in that system may find this exceptional. It is not, sad to say.

“While Isaac and Rebecka May, the Canadian couple who are fighting for their new-born baby’s life, are awaiting a January 27th judgment on their petition for a 90-day injunction against their hospital’s order to remove their baby Isaiah’s ventilator, some advocates for the disabled are saying that what the May’s are experiencing is shockingly common in Canada.

“According to Sam Sansalone, father of Katya Sansalone, who was born 8 years ago with full trisomy 13, in Canada “profoundly disabled kids are routinely – and intentionally – not treated with life-saving intervention.” Sansalone serves as co-chair of the Advisory Committee of Family to Family Connections at the Alberta Children’s Hospital, a family-centered care initiative recently launched in Southern Alberta.

“He said that “the dynamic that we had to fight became very quickly and firmly entrenched as soon as we had a genetic diagnosis.” “The clear mandate, at least at that time, was that you don’t save these disabled children’s lives,” he continued. “You allow them to die – even though the needed interventions are exactly the same as would routinely and unquestionably be given to quote-unquote normal children.”

There’s a lot wrong with this, not the least of which is some panel deciding which human beings are “normal.” And what qualifies them to define that.