Two different articles on the BBC website mention Terri Schiavo and euthanasia today, and both of them lack the critical reporting needed to determine whether the radical claims being made in them are true. As a result, the stories are based on anecdotes rather than facts, and heavily back the pseudoscientific claims of the "right to life" movement.

In the first article, a man—tabbed by the BBC as the Italian Terri Schiavo—claims that during his two-year coma, he was able to hear and understand everything around him. While there is a condition that describes this state, Locked-In Syndrome (Wikipedia), there are ways to tell the difference between the two, and it is unlikely the doctors would have made that mistake. The evidence given that the man, Salvatore Crisafulli, actually heard and understood all that was said around him is scant. The article also fails to differentiate between a coma, which can be reversible, and the persistent vegetative state (Wikipedia) of Terri Schaivo.

In the second article, Wanjiru Kihoro is described as "Kenya's Terri Schaivo." This article, written by Muliro Telewa, shrugs off medical evidence in favor of anecdotes from the victim's husband, who believes he can still communicate with his wife, and descriptions of elaborate prayer services. Telewa also quotes several people bashing the decision to remove Schaivo's feeding tube without presenting any other views.

Last time Gelf checked, a CT scan of Terri Schiavo's brain (Wikipedia) revealed that she had irreversible damage that had eroded several vital brain structures. No amount of prayer, anecdotes, or poorly conceived BBC articles can change that.