Nation IN BRIEF : ILLINOIS : Panel Urges Right to Refuse Life-Support

Patients have the right to refuse life-sustaining medical treatment but active euthanasia is wrong, a report released in Chicago said. The report was written by a task force formed by Cook County State’s Atty. Cecil Partee after an April, 1989, incident at Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center in Illinois in which Rudy Linares, holding hospital workers at bay with a gun, turned off his 15-month-old son’s respirator and cradled the baby in his arms until he died. Officials at the hospital had refused family requests to halt life support. The task force said a person should be judged capable of making the decision to end life support before medical officials take such action. It said surrogates could make the decision for those judged not capable and that parents could decide for children.