ISLAMABAD, Jan 13: The participants of a workshop on Islamic Medical Ethics were told here on Friday that harmful or irreversible contraceptive methods were not permissible in Islam, which always laid emphasis on sanctity of life. The speakers, Dr Malika Haque, clinical professor of paediatrics and international health at Ohio State University of USA, and Dr Mohammad Amin, dean and consultant psychiatrist, Shifa College of Medicine, held an interactive dialogue with the participants of the workshop organized at a local health institution.

The two speakers explained Islamic aspect of modern medical practice. While dealing with terminally ill Muslim patients, they said, extra care should be taken by providing access to Islamic tapes and Quranic recitation, and allowing frequent visits by family members. And whenever possible, Muslim patients should be prescribed alcohol or gelatin-free medicines.

They also condemned the practices of surrogate motherhood, organ transplantation from the dead to the living and cloning. However, they suggested that genetic engineering for defeating cancer and congenital disorders, and organ donation from the living to the living were permissible in Islam. On the issue of abortion, they said it was permissible only if mother’s life or health were in danger or if the congenital malformations were severe.

“Our religion advocates the importance of cure where necessity overrides prohibition and, therefore, a certain medical practice can be deemed permissible if it is the last hope for a patient’s survival,” they said.

Focusing on the issue of “Death and Dying”, Dr Malika, who has a sound background in Islamic ethical studies in the United States, said doctors should not take ‘heroic’ measures to keep a vegetative patient from dying a natural death as in many cases it only prolonged the agony.

Every patient has a right to die peacefully, however, for patients put on respirators for more than two months and not showing progress, cessation of machine life support should be considered only after having ‘Care Conference’ with their families.

Dr Malika advocated the need for providing nutrition, analgesic drugs and antibiotics besides other measures for saving a vegetative patient’s life. However, if his/her condition does not improve for two months or it deteriorates, doctors should not perform unnecessary surgeries or take unproductive ‘heroic’ measures to prolong the agony, she said.

Dr Amin suggested that terminally ill patients should not be tortured with unnecessary surgeries and medication, adding that if given a choice between breathing one’s last in a hospital intensive care unit and at one’s home amidst one’s family members, a terminally ill patient would most likely choose the latter.