This may seem a tad off-topic for this blog, but I could not less this go unnoticed:
AP reports:
A US navy nurse has refused to force-feed prisoners who are on an extended hunger strike at Guantánamo Bay, the first protest of its kind at the detention centre, a rights lawyer and US official has said.
The unidentified nurse declined to participate after deciding the practice was a criminal act, said Cori Crider,a lawyer for the British legal rights group Reprieve who spoke in a phone interview from London.
Read more on The Guardian.
When all about you have caved in to authority, I think it takes an especially strong sense of professional ethics and respect for human rights and dignity to resist. I have great respect to the unnamed nurse. Maybe if more nurses and medical personnel also declined to force-feed prisoners, our government would do more to end the human rights travesties at Guantanamo. It is 6 years since candidate Obama promised to close the facility and years since many of the prisoners were cleared for release.
Guantanamo has brought out some of the most problematic behavior in doctors and psychologists who participated in torture. I hope this one nurse’s principled and ethical stand serves to inspire others to also examine their own conduct in light of our profession’s ethical standards.