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b. Administering diuretics – the patient is receiving them but
they are insufficient.

c. Preventing the patient from drinking, which also damages
the kidneys but which can be controlled, though it entails great suf-
fering for the patient.

The question is, must the patient refrain from drinking when this
will cause him to suffer? And is it permitted for another person to
give him water?

Dr. David Jonathan Van Dyke, Head
of Department of Nephrology, Beilin-
son Hospital, Petach Tikvah

ɳ Response

The patient is obligated to refrain from drinking even if he suffers
tremendously, because his life depends on it. However, if he suffers
terribly from thirst he might be considered an annus, since he cannot
tolerate the pain and suffering.

The Mor Uketziah (328) writes similarly: “Some patients choose
to risk their lives in order to save themselves from terrible suffering,
such as those who opt for excision [surgery, which at that time was
life threatening,] because of a stone in the bladder or the male organ,
or kidney stones, which cause tremendous pain that is worse than
death, Rachmana litzlan [May the Merciful one save us]. For these
sufferers, they should be left to do as they desire without objection,
because on a number of occasions they have attained relief and they
recover, at any rate…. so long as the pain poses no danger they are not
acting correctly.” The Mor Uketziah thus allows a patient to endanger
himself in search of respite from severe suffering. In our case too then,
the patient is allowed to drink even though drinking might endanger
his life, because it is extremely difficult to bear the suffering of thirst
and there is no absolute certainty that refraining from drinking will
cure him and neither is there absolute certainty that it will not cause

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