Court Hears Petition To Force Teenager To Have Chemo Over Religious Objections

Today was the second day of a trial in a Minnesota state court on a petition filed by state child protection workers who want to force 13-year old Daniel Hauser to have chemotherapy and radiation treatments for his Hodgkins lymphoma-- a treatment that results in 95% survival rates. Daniel changed to complementary medicine, including dietary changes and ionized water, after suffering side effects from a first round of chemotherapy. Yesterday's Argus Leader reports on the background of the case, while AP and Fox News report further on the trial proceedings. The teenager says that he is a medicine man and church elder in the Native American religion of the Nemenhah band of Indians from Minnesota. While the family is not of Native American background, the boy and his mother were adopted into the band. Daniel says he will resist any attempt to administer chemotherapy to him, and his doctor says it would be difficult to forcibly administer it. However physicians say the boy is likely to die without the treatment.