Culture of Death ─ The Age of "Do Harm" Medicine

This is an updated and revised edition after fifteen years of one of the classic critiques of the modern bioethics movement. The new edition will show how the threats to the equality of human life and the potential for medical discrimination have accelerated since the publication of the first edition. Included in the new version: The Terri Schiavo Case, the spread of euthanasia, potential health care rationing posed by Obamacare, the Brittany Maynard assisted suicide firestorm, and the need to enact conscience laws to ensure that doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other health care protection who do not wish to participate in the intentional taking of human life do not suffer professional discipline, what the author calls "medical martyrdom." Smith also writes about the trend to exploit the body parts and functions of the destitute, what he calls "biological colonialism."

Lawyer and award-winning author, Wesley J. Smith, is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism. He is also a consultant to the Patients Rights Council.

In May 2004, because of his work in bioethics, Smith was named one of the nation’s premier expert thinkers in bioengineering by the National Journal. In 2008, the Human Life Foundation named him a Great Defender of Life for his work against assisted suicide and euthanasia, work for which he also received the Legatus Cardinal John J. O'Connor Award for 2014.

Smith left the full time practice of law in 1985 to pursue a career in writing and public advocacy. He is the author or coauthor of thirteen books. His Human Exceptionalism blog, hosted byNational Review Online, is one of the premier blogs dealing with human life and dignity.

Smith’s book Forced Exit: Euthanasia, Assisted Suicide and the New Duty to Die, a broad-based criticism of the assisted suicide/euthanasia movement has become a classic in anti-euthanasia advocacy and is now in its third edition, published by Encounter Books in 2006. Smith’s Culture of Death: The Assault on Medical Ethics in America, a warning about the dangers of the modern bioethics movement, was named one of the Ten Outstanding Books of the Year and Best Health Book of the Year for 2001 (Independent Publisher Book Awards).