By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS Staff Journalist In a bizarre example of life under a government-run health care program, a British woman has settled a lawsuit with the hospice that mistakenly killed her husband after erroneously concluding that his stomach cancer had returned and applying official guidelines that required the removal of his feeding tube and cessation of care. According to the British press and LifeSiteNews.com, 76 year-old Jack Jones, a retired bricklayer, was diagnosed with stomach cancer in May 2005 which led to the removal of his stomach.  Told that he was in remission from cancer, Jones continued to suffer pain following the operation as well as difficulties in eating. On Jan. 3, 2006, he went to the Marie Curie Cancer Care hospice for respite care. While there, his family was told by Dr. Alison Coackley that the cancer had returned even though no tests were taken to confirm this diagnosis. Dr. Coackley, a palliative medicine consultant, played a key role in drawing up the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP) protocol, a set of established guidelines for health care workers to use in the care of dying patients. As a result, Dr. Coackley told the family there was nothing further they could do for Jones, and the hospice was ordered to deny him food, water and all medication except painkillers. Jones died two weeks later. However, tests after his death found that the cancer had not come back, and that Jones was suffering from pneumonia brought on by a chest infection, a condition that could have been treated and resulted in at least two more years of life.  Just this week, Jones’ widow, Pat, settled out-of-court for the wrongful death only after being told that if she didn’t accept the settlement, she would lose her legal aid. Mrs. Jones called her husband’s treatment “barbaric” and accused the doctors of manslaughter.   “If they'd only treated his chest infection, my husband could still be alive today,” she said. “We fought in the hospice to get Jack the right treatment and they blocked us, making us feel we were a nuisance. I was worried it was pneumonia, I wanted them to check his chest, but they wouldn't.” Mrs. Jones and her family are demanding to know whether the hospice was treating her husband under the controversial LCP protocol, which is used by hundreds of government-run hospitals and care facilities, and is applied in as many as 20,000 deaths a year. The hospice claims the protocol was not officially used in the case of Jack Jones.  The case has only added to the furor building in England over the LCP protocol. Supporters say it brings dignity to a patient's final hours, but critics fear that it is being applied incorrectly. The LCP has also come under fire recently from a group of doctors who say that it fails to create safeguards for patients who may benefit from further treatment. A letter, signed by Professor Peter Millard, Emeritus Professor of Geriatrics, University of London and Dr. Peter Hargreaves, a consultant in Palliative Medicine at St Luke's cancer centre in Guildford, warned that the LCP is creating a "national crisis" in palliative care.   Patients are being diagnosed as being close to death "without regard to the fact that the diagnosis could be wrong," the doctors said. "As a result a national wave of discontent is building up, as family and friends witness the denial of fluids and food to patients." British Pro-life advocates agree that the LCP, combined with the provisions of the Mental Capacity Act and the promise by the Director of Public Prosecutions that in some cases people who assist others to commit suicide will not be prosecuted, have combined to create a situation in Britain where euthanasia and assisted suicide are de facto legalized. © All Rights Reserved, Living His Life Abundantly®/Women of Grace®  http://www.womenofgrace.com