If the patient is effectively braindead, treatment can be halted. In lesser cases, that is not possible, even if there is no prognosis for revcovery.

This legislation is about three years old and is still in its original form. Given our heavily Roman Catholic cultural heritage, this was about as far as it could be pushed the first time around. The first reports of the evaluation commission came out a couple of months ago. Everyone has been behaving respectably, it seems, and a number of issues were raised which are now serving as the basis to amend the law.

The debates to expand the law are considering issues like the coma cases without living will, minors with incurable forms of cancer and patients suffering from longterm and severe clincal depressions. There is significant support for the first two issues, but the third one is controversial to say the least.