But they want to be paperback writers

London newspapers have always been full of it, if you know what we mean. They love brassy headlines and sensational stories, and reporters know that if they want to continue to have their "steady job" they'd better make like a paperback writer. Considering this, we're wondering how much truth in a report in London's online version of The DailyMail that claims

With gangs of rapists and looters rampaging through wards in the flooded city, senior doctors took the harrowing decision to give massive overdoses of morphine to those they believed could not make it out alive.

The account is based on the testimony of one female doctor (who says she prayed "for God to have mercy on her soul") and corroborated by a hospital orderly, as well as a local emergency officially.

The story makes it appear as if there was wholesale euthanasia taking place throughout New Orleans.

Perhaps -- maybe -- this is true. But we are skeptical. Why?

The two writers quote only the woman doctor. They quote no other "on site" sources. They speak of an unidentified orderly once. He is never mentioned again.

The "corroborating" emergency official, William 'Forest' McQueen, is identified as a utility manager for the town of Abita Springs" which is "a half hour north of New Orleans." According to the report, he told relatives of the patients who had died that patients had been 'put down', saying: "They injected them, but nurses stayed with them until they died."

Mr McQueen has been working closely with emergency teams and added: "They had to make unbearable decisions."

How would a utility manager, not a medical worker, be privy to such informationl, and who, having taken a life-or-death decision into their own morphine syringe-laden hands, would confide in him? Doesn't make sense.

Then there is this:

Their families believe their confessions are an indictment of the appalling failure of American authorities to help those in desperate need after Hurricane Katrina flooded the city, claiming thousands of lives and making 500,000 homeless.

Again, no direct quotes from identified family members of patients who were euthanized. Just a general editorial comment indicting "the failure of American authorities."

As to the number of dead, that's still being determined. As to the number of homeless, at the moment it is far more than 500,000. An estimated 1.5 million people evacuated the Big Easy and suburbs before Katrina. All but a handful are still on the road.

Did a woman doctor confess to "mercy" killings? Perhaps so.

Was her action justified? Perhaps not. As she is quoted she still sounds panicked. Read this with your mental antennae and see if you can hear the sounds of someone who favors euthanize desperately trying to justify rash actions taken during moments of panic:

"I didn't know if I was doing the right thing. But I did not have time. I had to make snap decisions, under the most appalling circumstances, and I did what I thought was right.

"I injected morphine into those patients who were dying and in agony. If the first dose was not enough, I gave a double dose. And at night I prayed to God to have mercy on my soul."

The doctor, who finally fled her hospital late last week in fear of being murdered by the armed looters, said: "This was not murder, this was compassion. They would have been dead within hours, if not days. We did not put people down. What we did was give comfort to the end.

"I had cancer patients who were in agony. In some cases the drugs may have speeded up the death process.

"We divided patients into three categories: those who were traumatised but medically fit enough to survive, those who needed urgent care, and the dying.

"People would find it impossible to understand the situation. I had to make life-or-death decisions in a split second.

"It came down to giving people the basic human right to die with dignity. ..."

Any time someone flings the "basic human right to die with dignity" phrase out there, it usually means someone else is meeting their Maker ahead of schedule. Were there alternatives that could've been considered? Did anyone consider defending the critically ill patients against the looters, perhaps even with deadly force, as a morally superior option?

Then we are reminded of the nursing home in New Orleans where the staff and administration apparently abandoned about 30 residents to the floodwaters. Guess that was an opportunity to grant the basic human right to die with dignity, too?

UPDATE -- The AP is reporting that 45 bodies, most of them patients, were discovered Sunday at the 317-bed Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans.

We recommend priority autopsies and, if necessary, appropriate prosecutorial actions.