Parental Rights Cancer Controversy
A battle between the parents of a 12-year-old girl and the state of Texas over the best treatment for the girl's Hodgkin's Disease has mushroomed into a custody battle involving parental rights.
Pointing to doctors' opinions that radiation is needed, Texas has taken Katie Wernecke from her home. She and her parents insist the cancer is in remission and radiation isn't necessary. CBS News Correspondent Bob McNamara reports on The Early Show.
"I feel great," Katie says in a home video. "I don't need radiation treatments, and nobody asked me what I wanted. It's my body."
Her parents made the video, to protest Texas Child Protective Services efforts to have Katie undergo radiation treatment.
In court, arguing their parental rights, they tried to stop the radiation procedures on the grounds the treatments were dangerous.
"We do not believe this is the best treatment for our daughter because it can cause additional harm to her. There are other alternatives we can use if the cancer comes back," says Katie's father, Edward Wernecke.
Katie was taken into state custody from her parents nearly a week ago, McNamara reports, on the grounds they were not doing enough to treat her cancer.
She was hospitalized in Houston's MD Anderson Cancer Center.
Katie's last diagnosis recommended radiation treatments.
"There was a second opinion, a third opinion and a fourth opinion," points out Darrell Azar of Texas Child Protective Services, "and they all believe additional treatment is necessary."The girl's parents and state officials agreed that if a PET scan shows Katie's cancer has been stopped with chemotherapy alone, radiation could be cancelled, McNamara says. A judge will ultimately decide.
"If there are some alternatives that the parents prefer and those were proven medical alternatives that we could actually do," Azar says, "then we would work with parents on that. But we don't seem to have alternatives."
The case nearly cost the Werneckes' custody of their three other children but, after a hearing, a judge allowed the three to stay home.
On The Early Show Friday, the Werneckes' lawyer, Daniel Horne,
Russ Mitchell that, "The whole issue has been mischaracterized as the Werneckes wanting to deny medical treatment. That's really not the case. If it comes out that, after informed consent to the parents and the parents being involved in some decision-making with the doctors, that Katie needs radiation therapy or any other type of therapy, they would be willing to consent to that."Edward Wernecke told Mitchell, "Religion is not an issue here. It is just our right to choose the best care for our daughter. My understanding was the last PET scan, which was just over 30 days ago, there was no active cancer in her body."
Katie's mother, Michele, told Mitchell she doesn't even know how Katie is faring in state custody. ""I would really like to know. I'm afraid that she's under a lot of stress. She told me before she left that she'd quit eating and get depressed. I hope she keeps her strength up and keeps going. I would really like to know how she's doing, because I know she can't be handling this too well, either.
"(Doctors are) just looking at her tumor. They're not looking at what the body really, really needs and what she needs."