Kenneth Smith, from Alabama, is set to be the first person executed with nitrogen gas. Experts said concerns are being raised about whether or not it is cruel.
However, medical and legal experts told ABC News that nitrogen gas as a method for execution is untested and there’s no evidence the method will be any more humane or painless than lethal injection.
“I’ve never heard anyone say, ‘We’ve got this new method of execution. We’ve looked at it carefully. We know that this method of execution will cause a death that will not be cruel. Here’s the evidence,’” Dr. Joel Zivot, an associate professor in the department of anesthesiology at Emory University School of Medicine, told ABC News. “That’s what needed to be said. No one has said that.”
And it hasn’t been tested because researching the “best” method for executing humans is abhorrent and the scientific and medical communities have ethical standards.
But the State of Alabama doesn’t, a feature it shares with other regimes responsible for the worst atrocities in history.
The same technique is being studied for assisted suicides where the terminal patient gets to administer or even withdraw it themselves. That is likely to have a better ethical standing since it’s about dying with dignity if they can’t live with dignity. It’s likely to confirm if nitrogen asphyxiation is as painless as they claim.
That aside, some meds say that hypoxia is painless as long as carbon dioxide content in the blood remains low. Even carbon monoxide poisoning victims seem to die in sleep. That sounds way better than any of the other methods of execution. Not that I support the death penalty.
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And it hasn’t been tested because researching the “best” method for executing humans is abhorrent and the scientific and medical communities have ethical standards.
But the State of Alabama doesn’t, a feature it shares with other regimes responsible for the worst atrocities in history.
The same technique is being studied for assisted suicides where the terminal patient gets to administer or even withdraw it themselves. That is likely to have a better ethical standing since it’s about dying with dignity if they can’t live with dignity. It’s likely to confirm if nitrogen asphyxiation is as painless as they claim.
That aside, some meds say that hypoxia is painless as long as carbon dioxide content in the blood remains low. Even carbon monoxide poisoning victims seem to die in sleep. That sounds way better than any of the other methods of execution. Not that I support the death penalty.
The only thing worth “knowing” about this whole situation is that the death penalty is abhorrent and should have been banned decades ago.
I agree. And even ignoring how abhorrent it is, imagine how much money they’ve spent trying to kill this guy.