"Ashley's Treatment" Moves to Istanbul (Not Constantinople)

At least two families with a child suffering from cerebral palsy support another family's desire to have their son castrated. Castration, you see, is the means of achieving "Ashley's treatment" -- or stunting growth -- in males.

Füsun Evren, Umut Mert’s mother, earlier this week announced she was looking for a doctor who would stunt her son’s growth, in an operation now referred to as “Ashley’s treatment,” so named after a 9-year-old Seattle girl whose parents opted to stunt her growth with high-dose estrogen. Füsun Evren fears that if her son got taller and heavier they would be unable to hold or carry him. Umut Mert cannot eat, speak or walk by himself. “The only thing he has managed to do in 12 years was to hold his head up. I can’t even tell if he is in pain,” said Evren.

The article notes that Umut's height is 80 centimeters, which amounts to 31.5 inches or only 2 feet 7 inches tall. His weight is listed as 19 kilograms, or 41.8 pounds. Growth spurts may cause Umut some discomfort, but I can't imagine he would grow more than than 4 feet tall.

The parents say that Umut cannot sit up straight, probably due to scoliosis, which makes him unable to use a wheelchair.

I don't want to condemn the families for making this decision, but I find something inherently wrong with choosing to stunt your child's growth.

Thankfully, this procedure would require approval from Turkey's Ministry of Health’s Ethics Council.

Dr. Güler Saygun from the Turkish Disabled Persons Administration said that applying such a treatment would require approval from the Ministry of Health’s Ethics Council. The head of the Turkish Association for the Disabled, Zülfikar Akar, said: “We don’t think it’s the right choice, but the mother’s situation is indeed difficult. These situations happen because care centers don’t offer long-term care for people with disabilities.”

Care centers not offering long-term care for the disabled is a problem, but as Plato once said: "Necessity is the mother of invention." In my mind, stunting your child's growth does not an invention make.

Islamic culture once caused scientific discoveries to flourish, so there's no reason to believe they can't do it again.

Parents of Disabled Children Spport ‘Ashley’s Teatment’ [Today's Zaman]