Those executed may be awake as they suffocate to death

Having previous disparaged the use of capital punishment in a previous blog as pretty much sadistic , i found this report upon the lastest research into executions by so-called humanitarian methods .

Even when administered properly, the three-drug lethal injection method appears to have caused some inmates to suffocate while they were conscious and unable to move, instead of having their hearts stopped while they were sedated, scientists said.

No scientific groups have ever validated that lethal injection is humane, the authors write. The journal's editors call for abolishing the death penalty, writing: "There is no humane way of forcibly killing someone."

The study concluded that the typical "one-size-fits-all" doses of anesthetic do not take into account an inmate's weight and other key factors. Some inmates got too little, and in some cases, the anesthetic wore off before the execution was complete.Even the final drug did not always prove fatal as intended. At least one California inmate required a second dose.

In 2005 alone, at least 2,148 people have been killed by lethal injection in 22 countries, especially China, where fleets of mobile execution vans are used. Of the 53 executions in the United States in 2006, all but one were by lethal injection.

"The person would feel either asphyxiation or the burning sensation associated with the potassium" said Dr. Leonidas Koniaris, a surgeon and co-author at the University of Miami. "The potassium would cause extreme discomfort, something like being put on fire."

A biting socialist criticism of the death penalty can be found here .

Perhaps those who avow to be Marxists such as the Chinese leadership may ponder the words of Karl Marx
"...it would be very difficult, if not altogether impossible, to establish any principle upon which the justice or expediency of capital punishment could be founded, in a society glorying in its civilization... is there not a necessity for deeply reflecting upon an alteration of the system that breeds these crimes, instead of glorifying the hangman who executes a lot of criminals to make room only for the supply of new ones?"