Jahi McMath Alive? Neurologist Testifies Teen is 'Extremely Disabled But Very Much Alive'
A teenage girl declared brain-dead after a routine tonsillectomy is allegedly showing signs of life and is able to move on her own; her family has filed an appeal to have her legally declared "alive."
Jahi McMath went in for a routine tonsillectomy in Dec. 2013, but had complications following the surgery and was placed on life support. Her family battled Oakland Children's Hospital in California on whether to take the 13-year-old off the life-saving devices. They argued that she was still alive and wanted to give God the opportunity to work in her life, while the Hospital argued that she was dead and the life support should be removed.
After much debate, the family was able to send Jahi to a New Jersey facility, albeit on breathing and feeding tubes, but she was declared legally dead.
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"Jahi had surgery this morning and it was successful!! Now I can kiss her lips without that damn tube in the way and now she can get nutrition!! Thank you Lord! My child will heal. I believe it," Nailah Winkfield, Jahi's mother, posted online in January.
Now, Nailah has posted videos showing Jahi moving her feet in response to a command and claims that her daughter is actually alive. She has requested that the California judge reverse his decision, and a hearing has been scheduled for Thursday, Oct. 9.
According to the National Review, a source provided testimony from Dr. Alan Shewmon, professor emeritus in neurology at UCLA, stating that Jahi is "not only alive but now also awake."
"Based on the materials provided to me so far, I can assert unequivocally that Jahi currently does not fulfill the diagnostic criteria for brain death," Shewmon's declaration read. "The materials include extensive medical records from St. Peter's University Hospital, which I am still in the process of reviewing, videos of Jahi moving her hand and her foot in response to verbal requests by her mother, images from an EEG done in her apartment on 9/1/14, images of a brain MRI scan done at Rutgers on 9/26/14, and heart rate variability analysis by my colleague Dr. Calizto Machado based on the EKG channel from 9/1/14 EEG."
He added that Jahi is also having regular menstrual periods, which corpses do not. That, he argues, is further proof of her body still being alive and her brain sending messages to other parts of her body.
"Clearly, Jahi is not currently brain dead," he concluded. "Yet, I have no doubt that at the time of her original diagnosis, she fulfilled the AAN diagnostic criteria, correctly and rigorously applied by the several doctors who independently made the diagnosis then … She is an extremely disabled but very much alive teenage girl."
