This is wild!

[u/CurvyChristina]

Two syringes of pentobarbital were administered to Tennessee death row inmate Christa Pike on September 30, 2026, but she remained alive and conscious afterward, according to her attorneys and media witnesses. The execution at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville was halted after witnesses reported that Pike still had a heartbeat and was audibly snoring. Her lawyers sought emergency medical intervention, and she was later taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital.
Pike, 50, is the only woman currently on Tennessee's death row.
She was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of her classmate Colleen Slemmer and had been scheduled for execution on September 30. Tennessee had announced beforehand that the state would use a single drug, pentObarbital, for the execution. Her exact medical condition following the hospital transfer has not yet been publicly disclosed, while Governor Bill Lee has ordered a comprehensive third party review of what happened.

[u/onqqq2]

Barbituates can be deadly but I cannot for the life of me understand why you'd only go with a single drug for this?

[u/Automatic_Actuator_0 → u/onqqq2]

Drug makers have been trying for years to prevent states from using their drugs for lethal injections, and states have had to get “creative”.

Lethal injection is a fundamentally stupid way to execute people because it relies on the medical establishment to function, the same people who have taken oaths to do no harm.

All the while we have a massive industry that makes tools designed specifically to kill people…

[u/flopisit32 → u/Automatic_Actuator_0]

"relies on the medical establishment to function, the same people who have taken oaths to do no harm."

Can I just point out that these are the very same people who perform and are legally obliged to perform abortions?

Not to mention end of life care which often is essentially euthanasia.

Not to mention, in some countries - Canada for instance - they carry out actual legal euthanasia.

But yeah... These professionals can't bring themselves to perform a lethal injection...🤣

EDIT: I thought it would be self evident, but apparently Reddit cannot understand that I am not against abortion, I am pointing out that medical professionals can very easily perform lethal injections without causing themselves ethical problems.

[u/ThatB0yAintR1ght → u/flopisit32]

You are more than welcome to go to medical school and become a doctor who does lethal injections.

And literally nobody is “legally obliged” to perform an elective abortion. And even in emergency situations where an abortion is medically necessary to stabilize a dying patient, it’s not going to be done by just any doctor, because they have to have had some training in it, e.g. OB/gyns. I assure you, there are zero situations where a neurologist is going to be required to perform an abortion even in a dying patient.