Reading Prof Mallia’s page-long articles is akin to engaging in a chess or card game with the professor hiding his hand till the end paragraphs. He very cleverly and lucidly starts outlining cases and reasoning any average reader might agree to and entrapping the unwary in agreeing to what our Catholic set of beliefs hold in abhorence.

A case in point was his arguing in favour of the termination of life of a young ‘invalid’ patient and terming her carers as assasini in not so many words (The Malta Independent, 9 September 2009) for despite the girl’s immediate family opposition, the kind nuns, being dedicated servants of life and the poorest of the poor (for the voiceless fall in this category) were ready to continue caring for her, even if they did not garner any thanks from her family and from the likes of Prof. Mallia.

I shudder just thinking what sort of advice he proffers as ethics advisor to the Medical Council of Malta. Perhaps the learned Professor could enlighten us common people of any case he knows of a dead corpse “fed every four hours with a solution, for 17 years” still exhibiting eye and throat reflexes?

G. Bonett

Marsalforn