Alabama, unless stopped by the courts, intends to strap Kenneth Eugene Smith to a gurney Thursday and use a gas mask to replace breathable air with nitrogen, depriving him of oxygen, in the nation’s first execution attempt with the method.
The Alabama attorney general’s office told federal appeals court judges last week that nitrogen hypoxia is “the most painless and humane method of execution known to man.” But what exactly Smith, 58, will feel after the warden switches on the gas is unknown, some doctors and critics say.
“What effect the condemned person will feel from the nitrogen gas itself, no one knows,” Dr. Jeffrey Keller, president of the American College of Correctional Physicians, wrote in an email. “This has never been done before. It is an experimental procedure.”
Keller, who was not involved in developing the Alabama protocol, said the plan is to “eliminate all of the oxygen from the air” that Smith is breathing by replacing it with nitrogen.
Drug companies refuse to supply states with execution medications. Not sure if it’s liability, legality or ethics (probably not the latter). I’d think states could synthesize their own or use drugs they confiscated, though.
Also, the AMA and state medical boards punish doctors who agree to supervise executions, because to do so violates the Hippocratic oath.
Often doctors have travelled to the prison in secret, and go to great lengths to remain anonymous. Kinda like the hooded axe man of old.
Some of the drugs are not manufactured in the US. There has been an EU wide ban for selling drugs used in executions to the US without making sure they’re not used for executions. Which also is the reason why medical organizations were very unhappy few years ago when states lied to them in an attempt to get those drugs - as they risk getting cut off for legitimate medical use.
Reason for the EU ban is simple: We consider executions a human rights violation over here.
The appearance of having ethics matters for drug companies because of liability concerns.
The other thing that matters to big multinational pharma companies is when Italian prosecutors start charging their executives with murder. That’s definitely a “liability concern.”