Wow, Oklahoma, really?

Yeah, this is a little late, but... interesting.

There's a shortage of one of the three drugs used to kill people on death row.  I don't know if you knew that, but you do now.  It's the part that serves as an anesthetic.  So a lot of death sentences are being delayed until more sodium thiopental is produced.

Oklahoma didn't want to wait, so they're considering using drugs used to euthanize animals such as pentobarbital to do the job, which sounds humane until you realize we don't really know the dose necessary to kill a human without it being cruel.

In court briefs filed on his behalf, attorneys argue that pentobarbital is unsafe and is not approved by the Food and Drug Administration. They say there have been numerous problems in executions across the country even with the drug that has been tested. Defense lawyers also say the new drug is not an ultra-short-acting barbiturate, as the law requires.

I find myself mildly amused by their argument that it is "unsafe" considering the whole point is to kill someone, but I digress.  The point is that there are complications even with the usual drugs they use, so introducing a new method could spell disaster whether you believe in capital punishment or not.

Article found on NPR.