Diagnosis: Dereliction Of Duty.

• Author: Vliet, Elizabeth Lee
• Position: WORDS IMAGES

PHYSICIANS CANNOT treat patients effectively if they do not first establish the correct diagnosis. Physicians "ready" themselves to treat by going through a systematic process of evaluating the patient, and only then are able to "aim" treatment at the proper "target," before they "fire" a prescription to help the patient. We have a duty to go through this process in the right sequence. It is not ethical for physicians simply to "fire" off a treatment without aiming our treatment at the right target.

Yet, that reverse course--fire, aim, ready--is exactly what the mainstream media, politicians, law enforcement officials, and liberals are doing in the debate over gun control following the Parkland, Fla., shooting. One "treatment"-restrict gun rights (i.e., self-defense rights)-is recommended for everyone across the country, whether or not it actually addresses the correct "disease" that led to Nicholas Cruz's horrific killing spree. There has been little effort to evaluate what led to this young man's slaughter of his high school peers, or to even consider other "treatments."

Instead, the knee-jerk response to the Parkland shooting has been exactly like the reactions to other killings by mentally disturbed persons at Virginia Tech, Tucson Safeway, Ft. Hood, the Orlando nightclub, San Bernardino, and Central Michigan University: ban "assault" weapons, confiscate guns from law-abiding citizens, vilify the National Rifle Association, and revoke the Second Amendment

Physicians have a legal and ethical duty to carry out a proper diagnostic evaluation of their patients, and only then recommend treatment. Why don't we apply similar standards to evaluating the problem of violence and killing in our society?

Many contributing factors beg to be discussed-many originating in the "progressive" social policies of the past 40-50 years:

* The loss of traditional values and the removal of God from the public arena.

* The breakdown of the family and the marked increase in children growing up without fathers in the home.

* Loss of respect for human life with the dramatic increase in abortion on demand.

* The constant exposure to violence in games, TV, movies, and social media from early childhood on.

* Closing state facilities and putting the mentally ill out on the streets without adequate treatment resources or support systems.

* Ten-minute "med-check" psychiatry visits and overuse of psychoactive medicines without adequate time for evaluation, or development...