Doctor-assisted suicide?

[TwoOuter]

Assembly Bill 651, known as the California Compassionate Choices Act, was rejected by the State Senate Judiciary Committee recently. The bill was modeled after Oregon's law and would have allowed a doctor to prescribe a lethal prescription to a terminally ill patient diagnosed with no more than six months to live.

I have very strong feelings in favor of such legislation. I've seen several loved ones literally deteriorate before my eyes and it's simply a horrible way to end a life.

Ask anyone over the age of say 70 about death and you'll hear the same thing over and over: It's not a terrible thing when someone suddenly passes away. People say: "That's the way I want to go." And when someone with a terminal illness finally succumbs, everyone says the same thing: It's such a blessing that his/her suffering is over.

It seems ironic that in certain circumstances we welcome death with open arms and yet we're unwilling to give people the choice to end their own suffering.

[pryor15]

politics

[Magellan]

It never ceases to amaze me that most people have no problem putting down a pet because "it's the humane thing to do", yet many of those people have a big problem with euthanasing another human being. [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

[Blarg]

Nah, this isn't purely politics at all, pryor. It's politics in the sense only that almost everything is politics or can be legislated, but we're really talking about things like quality of life and personal choices, and the role of society vs the individual. That's broad enugh to go beyond politics.

Personally, I'm almost always saddened when the decision is made to go from the use of reason and the endorsement of individul freedom to the idea that others should make all our decisions, even the msot intimate and personal ones, for us. But as the country becomes more and more overtly religious, we'll only see more people sticking their noses into others' business in the name of Jesus or whatever.

[diebitter]

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politics

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If it turns political , it'll be moved.

If it doesn't, it's eminently suitable for tl:dr.

[poker-penguin]

My Grandfather got throat cancer, fought it for a while, it became pretty clear it was terminal.

His life sucked donkey balls for the last year or so. A healthy straight-backed man with bright eyes and a quick mind quickly turned into a skeletal husk, collapsed in a chair, constantly dozing because his body was so weak.

Basically he was shrivelling up and dying and the only thing anyone could do about it was to try and feed him high calorie meal replacement goo and painkillers. He knew it, we knew it, but nobody could do anything about it.

We were watching the news one day and something came on about euthenasia, and he said "that's a good idea". It was the strongest and clearest his voice had been for months.

This is a man who has been a devout Christian for his entire life and firmly believed in the sanctity of human life (in a literal sense - his involvement in WW2 caused him massive ethical problems between doing his duty to his country by fighting evil and his belief that killing people was one of the greatest sins). If he believed it was OK to help God along a little, I'm not going to argue with that. He was one of my main role models (the other being my father).

I don't know if he wanted it for himself, I didn't have the courage to ask. But after experiencing this, I firmly believe that if people who are mentally compentent to make such a decision want to make it, they should be allowed to.

I apologise if that's too political, just trying to establish my position.

I think there are a lot of reasons for our reluctance to duscuss, let alone allow it.

1) Modern Western society has a fear of death. We go to extraordinary lengths compared to most societies to hide the reality and processes of death from daily life and language, even our rituals of death try and minimise the emphasis on death, this especially true if we're talking about children - I remember being "too young" for my other grandfather's funeral.

2) The state wants to retain the sole power of life and death over its subjects.

3) Suicide is still seen as a mortal sin by the powerful Christian lobbies.

2 and 3 snipped because they're very political

[TwoOuter]

Sorry if this post verges on the political- I only mentioned the bill as a way to introduce the topic.

I agree with the above comments about the issue being the role of the state vs. the individual. Because I feel so strongly in favor of individual choice, I was hoping to hear opposing views to broaden my perspective.

Death is indeed still something of a taboo subject. People "pass away"- they do not seem to "die." It's not a pleasant subject for most, and I understand that, but it seems to be one of those things that we handle rather badly simply because it's the way we've always done it. The fact that it's so hard to even think about makes any change problematic.

Poker-penguin, I can definitely relate and sympathize with the story of your grandfather. It's truly a heartbreaking experience. In the past two years 3 people who were very close to me, including my father, died of cancer.

In many cases with cancer, there's a point where treatment options have been exhausted and you're in this limbo state of waiting for the cancer to kill you. It's morphine and diapers and hospice and floating in and out of consciousness. For many, death comes within a matter of days or weeks, but for others, like my cousin, it was months. Imagine what this was like for his wife and children.

To say that not assisting in this death was the right thing to do is beyond my comprehension. In fact, I'd call it borderline sadistic.

[posnera]

Like many things, this comes down to the question of which mistake are you more afraid of. On one side, to not allow physician assisted suicide allows the horrible situations already described. However, physician assisted suicide opens the door for people to be pressured (either directly or indirectly) into choosing suicide for financial reasons, or because they "don't want to be a burden." Also, many people who might choose suicide may be doing so out of fear of the future/unknown. Many people die with a reasonable quality of life, able to control their symptoms and get to spend more time with their families.

[poker-penguin]

Yeah, allowing doctor assisted suicide would create a lot of issues. I think it would have to be like every other major medical procedure - the specialist and GP would have to agree the person is a suitable candidate for it, and the person would have to give their informed consent. Hopefully doctors will be ethical enough to prevent greedy children from offing their confused mother. I'd also add that the case has to go to a review board once the specialist, the doctor have approved the patient's decision.

I'm not medically inclided, but I'd say the criteria should be that the patient is terminally ill and has a negative quality of life (measuring control of bodily functions, pain / nausea, and mental acuity - I think at least two of the three need to be severe / intolerable with no hope of mitigation)

My feeling is that medical science at the moment is keeping some people alive and suffering for the benefit of their families and that this is not in the patient's best interests.

Posnera, I think I am more scared of the horrible situations because I've seen one and I come from a very functional and moral family, so if the world was like us pressuring people into unnecessary suicide wouldn't be a danger.

I know if I'm ever terminally ill, I'd rather kiss my family good bye and walk up a mountain and to freeze to death than hanging around doped up [censored] ing myself. But like you say, it has to be the individual's choice - perhaps part of people's annual medical check up should be a discussion about how they'd feel if (that way if their view siddenly changes, the doctor can suspect family pressure).

[MidGe]

Well said, penguin,

I agree with most of what you say. I think choosing the moment of one's death should be allowed, since it is sometimes possible. The reason need not be assessed by the medical profession, altough the capability to make this decision may. It is a choice one can make for oneself. I have other posts about this on other threads and will not repeat here.

I would only suggest that a book that was #1 on NY Times Bestsellers List was first published in 1991 by Derek Humphry is a very good introduction to both the reasons and the means to do so, even in legislatures that forbid it.

I can't say anymore without being in breach of legislation here. I am sure a Google search will provide more information.

I definitely, unlike Pryor, think this is, or should be, totally unpolitical.