Igros Moshe (Choshen Mishpat II #73. 5) Question: If patient refuses to take medicine should he be forced? Answer: It depends on the reason for refusal. If it is the result of despair and hopelessnesss or because of the present suffering that he doesn’t want to continue even though he believes the doctors that he will eventually be cured. However if it is because he doesn’t believe his doctors then it is necessary to find doctors he believes. If this is not possible than his doctors will be forced to treat him against his will if all the doctors in the hospital agee that he needs this treatment. However this is only if he will is not terrified of the treatment since that might be harmful. In such circumstances he should not be forced even if his relatives desire it. His doctors need to discuss the matter thoroughly especially if the treatment is dangerous
Wednesday, May 7, 2025
Deciding about Tube Feeding
https://www.stjoes.ca/pdfs/PD3307_Deciding_Tube_Feeding(Internal).pdf
Survival period after tube feeding in bedridden older patients
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22239729/
Conclusion: Survival periods after tube feeding for less than 1 year were primarily determined by being bedridden for more than half a year without tube feeding and once pneumonia occurred; patients who were tube fed did not survive for more than half a year.
Israel blindsided by Trump's Houthi announcement, Trump says only 21 hostages are alive
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/defense-news/2025-05-07/live-updates-852948
"They said please don't bomb us anymore and we're not going to attack your ships," Trump said.
Trump changes his tune on the economy
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5283974-trump-tariffs-economy/
President Trump is changing his tune on the economy, suggesting Americans should buy less and will probably pay more and bear the brunt of an uncertain economic landscape as his wide-ranging tariff policy takes effect.
Trump and his economic team have for weeks said the tariffs would result in only short-term pain and that the tumult in the stock market would eventually level out.
America’s Air Traffic Fiasco
Thousands of flights in and out of Newark airport in recent days have been delayed, diverted or canceled owing to a long runway of air traffic control failures. President Trump wants to reorder the global trading system, but how about fixing America’s air traffic mess?
Order by Hegseth to cancel Ukraine weapons caught White House off guard
https://www.jpost.com/international/internationalrussia-ukraine-war/article-852950
Asked to comment on this report, the White House told Reuters that Hegseth had followed a directive from Trump to pause aid to Ukraine, which it said was the administration's position at the time. It did not explain why, according to those who spoke to Reuters, top national security officials in the normal decision-making process didn’t know about the order or why it was so swiftly reversed.
The story of how flights were canceled, detailed by Reuters for the first time, points to an at-times haphazard policy-making process within the Trump administration and a command structure that is unclear even to its own ranking members.
Trump: There are only 21 living hostages remaining in Gaza
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/407954
US President Donald Trump spoke to reporters on Tuesday and stated that 21 of the 59 remaining hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza are still alive.
"They told me a few days ago that there are only 21 hostages alive in Gaza," he said. “As of today, it’s 21. Three have died.”
He did not provide additional details.
Donald Trump Dismisses Price Increases—'That's Peanuts'
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-dismisses-price-increasesthats-peanuts-2067805
Ahmed Baba, co-founder and president of Rantt Media, wrote on X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday: "While Trump proudly raises prices on Americans and preaches scarcity, he is grifting hundreds of millions of dollars in his crypto ventures as he directly profits off the presidency. Just an unprecedented level of corruption while he economically harms everyday Americans."
Gosais touching
Igros Moshe (Choshen Mishpat II #73.3) Question: What is a gosais? Answer I have heard that doctors don’t recognize this category. Perhaps because from the medical viewpoint there is no significance since non Jews are not concerned whether touching and treating causes death and thus don’t prohibit it. There are two reasons for this. 1) They don’t know that it is prohibited to touch a gosais and that touching causes death. Even if they know they don’t care about killing in this manner. 2) In addition killing in this manner might not be prohibited to non Jews as we see in the gemora about Rav Chanina Ben Tradyon and the executioner.The Rambam rules that they are in fact responsible. Thus it is not clear what is the actual halacha to be learned from this gemora. It seems though that killing a gosais is also prohibited to a non Jew even though they don’t care or don’t know nor do irreligious Jewish doctors. Nevertheless a religious doctor needs to avoid touching a gosais. The Chevra Kadisha that exists in every city is aware of this. Therefore doctors in hospitals where people die need to become familiar with this.
Tuesday, May 6, 2025
US intelligence document undercuts Trump’s claims on Tren de Aragua, Alien Enemies Act
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5285879-trump-administration-contradicts-venezuela-gang/
Recently declassified intelligence contradicts Trump administration claims that the Tren de Aragua gang is coordinating with the Venezuelan government — undercutting a key basis for President Trump’s invocation of wartime powers to remove people to a Salvadoran prison.
In justifying his use of the 1789 Alien Enemies Act, Trump accused Tren de Aragua (TDA) of coordinating with President Nicolás Maduro — a basis for using powers to go after citizens of an “enemy nation.”
Trump is acting like it’s his choice whether he obeys the Constitution
https://edition.cnn.com/2025/05/05/politics/constitution-trump-nbc-interview-tariffs-canada
A composite image he shared on Truth Social of himself in papal vestments was surely meant to infuriate critics his acolytes could then mock as lacking a sense of humor — a familiar MAGA strategy. But the image, an offensive one to Roman Catholics, who view the pope as the guardian of the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven, is a knowing nod to Trump’s claims of infallibility. It was also shared on the White House’s X account — thereby becoming one of the most extraordinary official documents ever issued by the United States government.
Such concerns will not be alleviated by a bizarre answer in his NBC interview. “We lost 5 to 6 billion dollars a day with Biden. Five to 6 billion,” he told Kristen Welker, then went on to explain his 145% tariff on China: “We’ve essentially cut off trade relationships by putting that much of a tariff on. And that’s OK. We’ve gone cold turkey. That means that we’re not losing.” In other words, Trump has narrowed the trade deficit with China by halting trade altogether, a cataclysmic option that could deeply scar the US economy.
Hegseth Accused of More Chaos After Sudden Ukraine Aid Halt
https://www.thedailybeast.com/hegseth-accused-of-more-chaos-after-sudden-ukraine-aid-halt/
The embattled secretary of defense was revealed to have caused confusion on three continents with a verbal order to ground planes flying military supplies to Ukraine without anyone else—possibly including President Donald Trump—knowing.
The report, by Reuters, detailed how an order from his office at the end of January led to 11 flights carrying materiel, including artillery shells, being kept on the ground in Qatar. In a matter of hours, Ukrainian authorities began to panic about the whereabouts of the critical aid—with confusion spreading from Europe back to the White House, where senior officials had no idea what was happening. In later conversations with Kyiv, the Trump administration explained the momentary pause as “internal politics,” Reuters reported.
Waters to block hearing over Trump crypto concerns
https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5283505-trump-crypto-legislation-rebellion/
Waters told House Financial Services Chair French Hill (R-Ark.) that she would not approve the joint hearing unless the legislation included provisions to block Trump from profiting from the industry, which he declined to do, according to the staffer.