Dog performs Heimlich manuever

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A golden retriever performed a life-saving Heimlich manuever. Dogs, honored in some cultures and treasured in some families but not in others, do have heroes among them, whatever one's view of the cosmic order.

Current heroes a golden retriever whose medical acumen saved his owner's life. The dog received an ASPCA award, as did a cat who also saved a human's life:
When Debbie Parkhurst choked on a piece of apple at her Maryland home, her dog jumped in, landing hard on her chest and forcing the morsel to pop out of her throat. When the Keesling family of Indiana was about to be overcome by carbon monoxide, their cat clawed at wife Cathy's hair until she woke up and called for help.
Such heroism has to be noticed by humans.

I am much impressed with the book "A Language Older Than Words" in which the author upturns the notion of "dominion over animals" and asks whether we own them (and the Earth) or they "own" us. Ownership, he goes on to argue, is not the finest metaphor, but rather it is more a case of mutual interdependence and stewardship. Suddenly environmental awareness is looking very much like some forms of Buddhism at the place where secular ethics and spirituality converge. (See Healing at the Borderland of Medicine and Religion for more coverage.)

I agree with the ethical view that we are too species-centric, and with the coming of nanobots, 'friendly' AI, brain chips, wireless telepathy, and development of a "Type II" civilization that understands intelligence as ubiquitous in the cosmos and can enter intergalactic federations--if such exist, as some physicists (and not just Trekkies) speculate--"speciesism" must be revisited just as surely as other forms of psychological myopia.

Meanwhile let's celebrate Toby and Winnie for their life-saving measures.
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The Law Offices of Michael H. Cohen offers corporate legal services, litigation consultation, and expertise in health law with a unique focus on holistic, alternative, complementary, and integrative medical therapies. The law firm represents medical doctors, allied health professionals (from psychologists to nurses and dentists) and other clinicians (from chiropractors to naturopathic physicians, massage therapists, and acupuncturists), entrepreneurs, hospitals, and educational organizations, health care institutions, and individuals and corporations.

Michael H. Cohen is Principal in Law Offices of Michael H. Cohen and also President of a nonprofit organization exploring legal, regulatory, ethical, and health policy issues in the judicious integration of complementary and alternative medical therapies (such as acupuncture and traditional oriental medicine, chiropractic, naturopathic medicine, homeopathy, massage therapy, energy healing, and herbal medicine) and conventional clinical care. Michael H. Cohen is author of books on health care law, regulation, ethics and policy dealing with complementary, alternative and integrative medicine, including Healing at the Borderland of Medicine and Religion, Complementary and Alternative Medicine: Legal Boundaries and Regulatory Perspectives (1998), Beyond Complementary Medicine: Legal and Ethical Perspectives on Health Care and Human Evolution (2000), and Future Medicine: Ethical Dilemmas, Regulatory Challenges, and Therapeutic Pathways to Health Care and Healing in Human Transformation (2003).
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Health care and corporate lawyer Michael H. Cohen has been admitted to the Bar of California, Massachusetts, New York, and Washington D.C. In addition to qualifying as a U.S. attorney, he has been admitted and to the Bar of England and Wales as a Solicitor (non-practicing). For more information regarding the law practice of attorney Michael H. Cohen, see the FAQs for the Law Offices of Michael H. Cohen. Thank you for visiting the Complementary and Alternative Medicine Law Blog.
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