Q Should doctors follow the wishes of terminally ill patients? The long-awaited outcome of the Law Reform Commission's study on advanced directives was a waste of everyone's time. Why is it so wrong for a patient who is knowledgable and totally in control to make a decision in advance on what he or she wants, should a medical event happen whereby they will no longer be able to take that decision? If a patient has a cancer he/she is perfectly entitled to refuse surgery; so why can he/she not make that decision in advance? Legislating for the advanced directive will remove the arguments we are reading in your columns and allow a medical team to perform as directed. Legislating this does not mean that everyone has to do it; thus I fail to understand the argument the patients' rights group advocates. The proposal by the Law Reform Commission will leave us in the same situation we are facing with organ donations. Doctors are still not able to obtain organs from patients who have signed organ donor cards and carry them because the family refuses. Why is it a person's wishes are respected most of the time, but when we talk about death and dying, they are so blatantly ignored? The Law Reform Commission's recommendations were most disappointing. Dr Philip S.L. Beh, department of pathology, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, HKU I agree that doctors should follow the wishes of terminally ill patients because we should respect human rights, so we should have the right to choose to be rescued, or not to continue suffering from severe illnesses. Some patients may find their medical treatment or rehabilitation process painful and they may want to stop the suffering. I believe that doctors have a duty to serve the best interest of their patients. So, it would provide a better option for both patients and doctors if the government introduced a new law that allowed doctors to follow the wishes of the terminally ill patients. Nowadays doctors always face the dilemma when patients and their families have different wills - while patients may want to terminate their lives, their families always want doctors to rescue their loved ones. If Hong Kong had a new law to address the issue, then this kind of dispute could be avoided. Joyce Ho Sin-tung, Hunghom Q Should more money be made available to train talented young musicians? I am so happy to hear that two young prodigies have won international awards. Nowadays, a lot of secondary schools do not have music lessons after Form Three and many students do not come directly into contact with music. It is very upsetting that some students who are really talented can't practise music in schools. In fact, in recent years, many Hong Kong people have won international music awards, but there are not enough resources in music and the arts. The government should make more funding available for talented children. The more funding, the more children may win awards and Hong Kong could nurture talented musicians. This can help Hong Kong develop a good image and foreign parents may send their children to Hong Kong to learn music. This is not only good for the children, but also can improve the economy of Hong Kong. Littlewai Li, Tai Po Q What should be done with Lantau's wild cattle? I can only agree with Richard Straw [August 16] that some people just don't get it right. Even though some of the farmers in Lantau may be farming illegally, what has that got to do with the fact that many of them use makeshift materials to fence off their plots to prevent their crops from being destroyed by the wild cattle? Obviously Mr Straw is not aware that most land in Lantau belongs to the indigenous inhabitants, except whatever land has been bought by the government. And fortunately it is extremely difficult for so-called Central-based property developers to buy and to develop land here, due to the very strict government regulations on changing the original farmland to residential or industrial property. If this was the case, the whole of Lantau Island would look like Discovery Bay. So it is simply not true that the farmers here can just sit back and enjoy their wealth, while watching the cows destroy their crops. Try and get your facts right, Mr Straw! Terkild J. Terkildsen, Mui Wo Q Should there be more controls on pet crematoriums? I think that all the complaints from neighbours of the pet crematorium are reasonable, as they probably think it is a really horrible smell from all the dead pets being burned. I think the crematorium should me moved onto the outskirts of the village where the smell would be less noticeable. I also think the crematorium should have a proper incinerator and proper air-cleaning facilities. As there is a possibility that dioxins and a range of Volatile Organic Compounds are present in the smoke that is emitted by the crematorium, scientists should investigate the effects. The crematorium should also require its workers to wear gas masks to prevent them inhaling any toxins. William Hall-Jones On other matters... I refer to comments by Mrs Hilda Lam of the Hong Kong Observatory published in the SCMP today [17 August] under 'On other matters...' of the Talkback column. The comments were made by Mrs Lam on behalf of the director of the Hong Kong Observatory, hence Mrs Lam signed the letter 'for the director of the Hong Kong Observatory'. As the director of the Hong Kong Observatory is Mr C.Y. Lam, your omission of the word 'for' may cause confusion to readers. Wing-mo Leung, senior scientific officer, for director of Hong Kong Observatory
