The vegetative state and euthanasia Much media attention has been paid to the very practical use of euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide on patients who are in a vegetative state or in an irreversible coma. The truth is that a significant number of these cases actually recover. This essay is dedicated to those guys, some very young, who would have been killed if euthanasia/assisted suicide had been legalized. Let's begin our consideration with a nine-year-old boy named Ryan Atencio. He was taken off life support, except for a feeding tube, after being in a vegetative state following a severe head injury in a Dec. 10, 1988, car crash. "There was no brain function," said Dr. Eustaquio Abay of St. Francis Regional Medical Center in Witchita, Kansas. “Three or four times we saw the pulse drop to zero: no circulation to the brain for 30 minutes straight.” Yet, on January 19, 1989, Ryan shook his mother's hand, opened his eyes, and came back to life, so to speak (boy). Mitchell Berman, also 9 years old, was in a coma for 5 months due to a hemalytic disease. -uremic syndrome and was not expected to survive. On May 31, 1991, Mitchell spoke his first words since falling into a coma on December 31, 1990. "I want a hot dog," he told his mother. Since then, his progress has been phenomenal, said Dr. Geof McPhee, director of pediatrics at New Medico Rehabilitation and Skilled Nursing Center of the Gulf Coast in Slidell, Louisiana. “If he has residual deficits, I don't think it's going to slow this guy down” (Boys). Yolanda Blake, a 53-year-old New Jersey woman, awoke from a coma on December 15, 1990, just one day after a judge ruled that the hospital does not have to follow the woman's father's request...... half of the document ......ED:"Author recounts nine-day coma that 'transformed my life,'" Leslie Walters, Minnesota Women's Press, 7/16-29/89, p. 9. “Boy Who Gone Opens Eyes and Shakes Mother's Hand,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer (United Press International Report), 1/26/89, p. A3 “Boy's Complaints After Coma Are Welcome,” The (FargoMoorhead) Forum (AP Report), 6/9/91, p. A17 “Extraordinary Awakening,” ABCNews.com, 4/1/2000 “Rare Procedure Helps Woman in Coma Deliver Healthy Baby,” The Billings (MT) Gazette (AP Report), 12/11/88, p. A4."State releases videotape in right-to-die case," The New York Times National, 5/2/91, P. A16"Woman denied food wakes from coma," Liz Townsend , National Right to Life News, 8/1/91, pp. 1 and 24."Woman in right-to-die lawsuit 'is better,'" Karen Brandon, Kansas City Star, 1/11/91.1