Tuesday, November 30, 2021

Portugal's President de Sousa vetoes euthanasia bill.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa
The Associated Press reported that Portugal's President, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, has vetoed the second euthanasia bill this year, a bill that was passed by Portugal's parliament in early November.

President de Sousa reportedly vetoed the second euthanasia bill because of contradictions in the language of the bill. According to the Associated Press article:
This time, the president is returning the reworded law to the national assembly, according to a statement posted on the Portuguese presidency’s website late on Monday, arguing that further clarification is needed in “what appear to be contradictions” regarding the causes that justify resorting to death with medical assistance.

Whereas the original bill required “fatal disease” as a pre-requisite, the president’s argument followed, the renewed version mentions “incurable” or “serious” disease in some of its formulation. No longer considering that patients need to be terminally ill means, in De Sousa’s opinion, “a considerable change of weighing the values ​​of life and free self-determination in the context of Portuguese society.”
My reading of the euthanasia bill was that it was oriented to euthanasia of people with disabilities.

On January 29, Portugal's parliament passed a first euthanasia bill. On February 19, President de Sousa did not to sign the bill into law but instead he referred the bill to Portugal's Constitutional court for evaluation. President de Sousa stated that he thought that the bill was: 

"excessively imprecise," potentially creating a situation of "legal uncertainty."
On March 15, Portugal's Constitutional court rejected the euthanasia bill. The Portuguese American Journal reported that the Constitutional court decided that:
“the law is imprecise in identifying the circumstances under which those procedures can occur.” The court stated the law must be “clear, precise, clearly envisioned and controllable.” The law lacks the “indispensable rigor.
In July, 2020 I reported that the Portuguese Medical Association informed the government that they will not permit doctors to participate on the euthanasia commission (the commission to approve euthanasia). At the same time, a group of 15 law professors, including Professor Jorge Miranda, known as the father of Portugal's Constitution, stated that the euthanasia bills are unconstitutional.
 
Parliament is dissolving on December 5. A new bill cannot be debated until after the January 30, 2022 election.
 
More information about this topic:

Monday, November 29, 2021

Belgian euthanasia doctor accused of unlawful euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Belgian euthanasia protest
The veneer of Belgian euthanasia has been peeling off with the publicity of the trials in the Tine Nys euthanasia death and the case launched by Tom Mortier to gain justice in the death of his healthy but depressed mother.

A court decision to determine if the doctor made a mistake in the death of Tine Nys was expected last month but has not yet been promulgated.

Recently a doctor was arrested after a complaint stated that the doctor had unlawfully euthanised a 91-year-old man in the Jan Palfijn hospital in Ghent. The hospital first suspended the doctor from his duties and then withdrew the suspension.

According to Amelie Outters reporting for VRT.BE:
On Saturday 20 November, after the death of an elderly patient, a "possibly unlawful euthanasia" was reported to the police, according to the East Flanders prosecutor's office. An investigating judge was requested to investigate the exact circumstances of the termination of life and the doctor was arrested and brought to trial. He was released under strict conditions after extensive questioning by the investigating judge.
Doctors at the Jan Palfijn hospital recently protested that the hospital managers contacted the public prosecutor without first discussing the accusation with the doctor.

A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) on March 19, 2015 stated in the Flanders region of Belgium (2013), more than 1000 assisted deaths were done without explicit request and almost half of the assisted deaths were not reported.

It looks like a “cover-up” when an independent study produces hard data concerning the lack of oversight with the Belgian euthanasia law while the government evaluation committee claims that there are no problems with the euthanasia law.

Germany: You Must Be Fully Vaxxed before dying by Assisted Suicide

This article was published by National Review online on November 28, 2021.

Wesley Smith
By Wesley J Smith

The ironies of assisted suicide never end. Germany allows suicide on demand — including assistance — as a fundamental constitutional right. But now, you must be vaccinated against COVID before a euthanasia group will help you kill yourself. From the Spectator story:
As European countries battle to limit the spread of the virus, Verein Sterbehilfe – the German Euthanasia Association – has issued a new directive, declaring it will now only help those who have been vaccinated or recovered from the disease. In a statement, the association said:

“Euthanasia and the preparatory examination of the voluntary responsibility of our members willing to die require human closeness. Human closeness, however, is a prerequisite and breeding ground for coronavirus transmission. As of today, the 2G rule applies in our association, supplemented by situation-related measures, such as quick tests before encounters in closed rooms.”

‘Close encounters in closed rooms’ – what a fabulous German euphemism for assisted suicide.
Sometimes words even escape me!


Rethinking ‘dying with dignity’

This interview was published by MercatorNet on November 29, 2021.

Dr Ole Hartling
Dr Ole Hartling is a Danish nuclear medicine specialist. For five years he was the chair of Denmark’s Council of Ethics. Recently he wrote a book (in Danish and English) on euthanasia, “Euthanasia and the Ethics of a Doctor’s Decisions”. MercatorNet asked him to comment on the autonomy argument for ”assisted dying”.

If I could begin with a personal question… You relate in your book the lingering and painful death of your wife Katrine from renal failure. What did you learn from living with her illness?

I learned an aspect of the patient-doctor relationship in connection with assisted dying, and it is one that I had not been thoroughly aware of. But it was so lucidly taught to me by Katrine.

In 2008 Katrine was put on dialysis due to a kidney disorder.

The dialysis sessions were gruelling, but vital, and by the end of 2011 had become necessary every other day. Four or five hours’ dialysis, a break the following day, then again. As the time for dialysis approached, the accumulation of fluids started to torment her. Her breathing became laboured, and she had pressure across the chest.

There was the transport to the ward. The waiting time. The many hours tied to the couch. She was capable of reading a little but interruptions were frequent. For many hours immediately after dialysis, she was extremely tired owing to the body’s reaction to the volumes of fluid that were being “moved” and cleaned, and to the rapid reduction in the body’s volume of fluid.

After that there were a few hours of being more or less comfortable, unless she felt queasy or had a headache. You might call it an oasis of comfort between dialyses. The fear of the next dialysis was gradually superseded by a longing for it, due to the mounting fluid pressure, with shortness of breath and strain on the heart.

She yearned so badly for normal days without pain and nausea but they were few and far between. And there was an overwhelming certainty that there was no prospect of recovery. She cried at night in her hospital bed – out of loneliness, exhaustion and privation.

“I know what I can do,” she said one day. “I’ve been thinking it over. Want to hear?” I nod cautiously. Her eyes come to rest on me. She is serious. “Well, one night I’m going to open up my dialysis catheter. It’s quite possible; they don’t watch me so much at night-time. The blood will slowly drip out. Because of the anti-coagulation therapy, it won’t stop. I’ll slowly fall asleep …”

And then hardly pausing, she went on. “No, no – when you look at me like that, I won’t do it.”

Katrine was thinking of taking her own life for her own sake and refrained from it for mine — or perhaps for her own sake too. Did she tell me about it to find the courage to carry on living? Because I believe it gave her strength that, despite pain and misery, there was something to live for. Somewhere she needed my dismay, making her utter the words: “No, when you look at me like that, I won’t do it!”

My conversation with Katrine emphasizes that no serious decisions are taken “regardless” — that is, no decisions can be divorced from the relationships we have. In particular, though, she also taught me that a desperate person – it may be one of those closest to us but can also be a less familiar person, a patient for example … a desperate person may need to be met with more than just a logical understanding that it is best to go to one’s rest now.

Why do opinion polls so often show that about 70-80 percent of the public want euthanasia?

Yes, this finding is quite constant, but I believe there is a great risk that many of these results have been flawed. One reason could be that the questions in surveys are leading because they must at the same time explain what the question is about, and naturally this explanation does not contain obtrusive terms such as “killing”. On the contrary, the wording is usually chosen to be acceptable.

I have seen polls that simply contain the two main arguments for legalization that invariably appear in this debate: avoiding unbearable suffering and respecting the right to self-determination. In the accompanying explanation words like “voluntary” and “advisedly” often appear because that is how legalization is thought to be established, and these terms appeal to the fine and widely acknowledged concepts of individual autonomy and free will.

Another reason may be even more important. The majority of people who are surveyed are healthy. They cannot imagine themselves being crippled, blind, deaf, suffering, on dialysis, demented and dependent on care. They would rather die than experience this – or so they think.

The other day I had a talk with a colleague who is a neurologist. He explained that his (healthy) friends favoured legalization whereas his sick patients did not.

In fact, some years ago I found a survey on the issue of assisted dying among oncology patients. Their support for legalization of euthanasia was considerably lower than among healthy people. At the time of writing I cannot find this study, but a few of this kind have been made.

There is another group of people which usually does not favour legalization, and that is physicians. They know who will be expected to be in the front line, if it comes to taking the lives of patients.

If I understand you correctly, autonomy at the brink of death is different from the autonomy we exercise when we decide whether to buy a car or a motorcycle. Could you explain that?

This is an important question in as much as referral to autonomy is a core argument in the supporting of legalization of assisted dying. However, exercising autonomy can to some extent be illusionary – and for more than one reason.

With a law on euthanasia or assisted dying this possibility would inhabit everyone’s consciousness – the patient’s, the doctor’s, the relatives’, and the care staff’s – even if not formulated as an out-and-out offer. How autonomously can the weakest people act when the world around them deems their ill, dependent, and pained quality of life as beyond recovery?

Patients can find themselves directly or indirectly under duress to choose the option of dying if they consider themselves sufficiently pained and their quality of life sufficiently low. Patients must be at liberty to choose assisted dying freely, of course – that is how it is presented – but the point is that the patient cannot get out of having to choose. It has been called the “prison of freedom.”

Pressure on the patient does not have to be direct or articulated. It may exist as an “internalized external pressure”. The French bioethicist Emmanuel Hirsch expressed this in the following way:

“A patient may truly want to die, but this desire is not the fruit of his freedom alone, it may be – and most often is – the translation of the attitude of those around him, if not of society as a whole which no longer believes in the value of his life and signals this to him in all sorts of ways. Here we have a supreme paradox: someone is cast out of the land of the living and then thinks that he, personally, wants to die.”

An inherent problem of autonomy in connection with assisted dying is that a person who uses his or her presumed right to self-determination to choose death definitively precludes him or herself from deciding or choosing anything. Where death is concerned, your right to self-determination can only be exerted by disposing of it for good. By your autonomy, in other words, you opt to no longer have autonomy.

At any rate, autonomy is not the only factor or even always the key factor when deciding whether assisted dying or euthanasia can be granted. It is not enough to refer to the fact that the patient requested it. In other words, it is not only the patient’s own evaluation that is crucial. The value of the patient’s life must also be assessed as sufficiently low. That the patient’s right to self-determination will always be relative is not fully acknowledged in the debate.

A competent and legally capable person must have the option of voluntarily choosing assisted dying in the event of unbearable suffering, but why does suffering have to be a requirement?

The answer is straightforward: our concepts of assisted dying imply that compassion must form a decisive element of the decision – mercy killing and compassionate killing are synonyms for euthanasia. But this leads instantly to the question of why we should not also perform assisted dying on people who are not in a position to ask for it themselves but are also suffering.

Some people find the reasoning unproblematic: after all, relieving suffering is a duty. But in this particular context it is not unproblematic, because it effectively shifts the focus from the autonomy claimed. According to prevailing ideas about autonomy, patients initially evaluate their quality of life themselves, but ultimately it is those around them who end up gauging that quality and the value of their life.

That is to say, the justification for so called assisted dying is based on the premise that certain lives are not worth living rather than the presence of a request. The whole point is that in the process, respect for the patient’s autonomy is not independent of other things.

There is an intriguing paradox in this debate. You wrote in your book that “A ‘dignified death’ is not to give life because it is worth a lot, but to want to dispose of it because it is not worth anything.” Do we need to rethink the idea of “dying with dignity”?

Yes, I do think rethinking is necessary. I cannot imagine a single person who would not wish death to take place with dignity for both themselves and others. The words “dignity” and “dignified” are persuasive, because they are associated only with positive thoughts, and that makes it difficult to disagree. A suicide clinic in Switzerland is run by an association bearing the name “Dignitas” – the Latin word for dignity. In the US state of Oregon, the law on physician assisted suicide is called the Death with Dignity Act.

But to many people’s ears dying with dignity has become a paraphrase – and almost a synonym – for euthanasia and assisted dying. In my book, I quote the medical ethicist David Albert Jones, who said: “The principles of autonomy and the alleviation of suffering have often been expressed in terms of human dignity: The dignity of a chosen death and the indignity of suffering and dependence.”

By equating “a dignified death” with euthanasia, this not being in control over the time of death becomes undignified in its own right. The fact that a person can determine and make his or her own choice is regarded as dignified. That dignity ties in with the ideology of self-determination and autonomy.

It is alarming if autonomy is made the benchmark for human dignity. For if we link dignity with autonomy, with being in control over things, control of our life and our functions, we will ineluctably end up linking indignity with not having control of our capacity for reasoning, walking, passing water and so on.

Where we “earn” our dignity ourselves, we become vulnerable, for that dignity can be threatened by guilt and shame. That dignity is fragile, for it depends on our own abilities and depends on whether we are in control of our functions and our life. But in that case indignity is involuntarily linked to not being in control.

Dignity here becomes almost synonymous with self-esteem or self-regard, and it can be dismantled in a person who feels unwanted. Those who surround a person – the relatives and hospital staff, for instance – can therefore have a powerful influence on the way a person perceives himself and his life.

A person can lose his self-respect. If a person feels rejected and redundant, for that reason he or she may feel unworthy and disowned, having a fractured sense of dignity and perhaps even wish to be dead

We see dignity in the choice made by members of society in bygone ages when, enfeebled and burdensome to the community, they placed themselves outside of it and sought death of their own accord. This was to enable the others to survive and live to fight another day. Was it not dignified, too, almost transcending comprehension, when four young chaplains during the Second World War handed their life jackets and seats in the lifeboat over to others and drowned? A stamp was published to commemorate their heroic deed.

The dignity in these examples comprises the existence of something that is worth more than life, and they show that one’s life can be given for someone else.

In my book, I quote the theologian Rudolph Arendt, who said: “Life is too good to throw away, but not too good to give away. On the contrary, it is best, if given away, that it happens either in an instant, or that all of life go with it. The paradoxical thing about life is that it can only be given away when it is held in high esteem. Where life is disdained, it cannot be given away, though certainly thrown away perhaps, which is something altogether different. Only because life is great is it great to sacrifice life …”.

In the campaign to legalize assisted dying the concept of dignity has been displaced – imperceptibly but displaced quite decisively conceptually – so as to make the meaning almost the opposite. “A dignified death” is not to give life because it is worth a lot, but to want to dispose of it because it is not worth anything.

We speak perhaps of it being undignified for the patient not to be able to fend for him or herself but to need care. Is it conceivable that a person’s dignity is another word for a person’s worth here? A euphemistic paraphrase of the word value? If dignity is interlinked with or in reality means value, it is an objectification, and that is a violation of a golden rule of ethics. It is offensive and painful for a person to become an object. And moreover, not to be valued, but evaluated. And if it takes place under cover of referring to dignity or of the patient’s situation now being unworthy, it is hypocritical, and a far cry from the dignity there should be in human relations. Can the actual assessment of a person’s quality of life and the evaluation of a person’s life-value play a part in devaluing it?

The Belgian oncologist Benoit Beuselinck whom I quote in my book said: “The pressure on doctors also increases due to communication with slogans. If euthanasia is defined as ‘dying with dignity’, doctors who do not perform euthanasia are implicitly labelled as inhumane.”

He also stated that, ”Some Belgian palliative care units, that have opened their doors to patients requesting euthanasia, have seen nurses and social workers leaving the unit because they were disappointed that they could no longer offer palliative care to their patients in an appropriate way. They were upset that their function was reduced to preparing patients and their families for lethal injections.”

To summarize, we do need to rethink the idea of “dying with dignity”? There is a difference between bringing about death as a form of care and giving care for the dying. Those working in palliative therapy have been involved in ensuring that “a dignified death” is not merely a beautifying turn of phrase for euthanasia and therefore that advocates of legalizing euthanasia or assisted dying do not have a monopoly on the concept of dignity.

The introduction of assisted dying will not give dependent people a free choice. The choice will only be free once we start seriously telling a new story – a narrative that informs why it is worth living as a sufferer and dependent, not just why it is worth dying. 

I was intrigued by your analysis of a request for “assisted dying”. You point out that the decision is never fully autonomous because a doctor is still a gatekeeper. Can a patient ever be fully autonomous?

No, it may be a fundamental illusion that we are autonomous as if we were living in a vacuum. No serious decisions we take can be divorced from the relationships we have.

But there is more to it: the doctor also has autonomy, so to speak. Although patient autonomy is a consistent principle running through the care and management of patients, it must be remembered that autonomy means that he or she has the right to decline any treatment. It does not entail a right to have any treatment the patient might wish for. In other words, patients do not have the right to demand treatment that signifies another’s duty to fulfil that right.

Thus, if with “fully autonomous” you mean that any choice that the patient makes is to be respected the answer is No. If that were the case, autonomy would be the same as “autocracy”– rule of the self over others. As a consequence, rejecting any claim that the person might make is not a violation of a patient’s self-determination – for example, there may be sound medical reasons for not complying with a demand. To be precise, refusing to kill a person cannot be a violation of that person’s autonomy.   

You make a very telling observation – that when a patient makes a rational request for euthanasia, a “Yes” validates their own feeling of redundancy and lack of self-worth. In your experience, how does euthanasia affect the doctor-patient relationship?

It is my conviction that if the doctor who is the one to alleviate suffering is also the one to take life and/or help with dying, it invariably will influence the patient-doctor relationship.

It is an often-heard statement that the opening of an assisted dying option makes possible a better discussion of the approaching end. But when the patient and the doctor speak openly about the wishes of the patient, the doctor is left with a choice: should he improve hope and life or should he support the patient in the patient’s giving up?

If it is accepted as a normal part of the doctor’s job to help the patient give up, it can influence that relationship. The patient may well falter between suicide and hope and will lose the doctor as an unambiguous ally with life and hope.

If assisted dying is legalized it may also influence the patients’ own participation in the relationship. Should a doctor not be willing to assist a patient’s suicide, the patient can still get it elsewhere (if it were legalized), and the patient is suddenly gone – dead. The certainty of this possibility can influence the doctor’s unconscious investment in the relationship, or even be seen as a type of competition, where the doctor who remains on “the side of life” has to outdo the “assisted dying colleague” as the one who is the best helper of the patient.

I – as a doctor – want to remain the one who stands for hope, mitigation, relief of suffering and not being overcome by the patient’s feeling of hopelessness. It may be a help for both doctor and patient that the law still establishes a barrier. 

A patient may already feel redundant when he or she makes a rational request for assisted dying, but this feeling of redundancy can be reinforced when he or she is met with a rational understanding that this would be the best option. Would the rational approach include a form of abandonment or even repudiation?

In the communication between the doctor and the patient we make use of both rational and irrational languages. This happens more or less unwittingly but it is absolutely defined by the circumstances under which we think, act and live.

This is a forgotten aspect of the debate, and the one to which Katrine opened my eyes. In a country with legalized euthanasia, the message is: “You are requesting your own death. That is understandable; you have an unbearable condition, and we cannot do that much more. But you must consider your request carefully. I will return to hear whether you still mean it. (According to the rules the request must be sustained.) I also need to run it past a colleague before we can proceed with such action. (An impartial colleague must be consulted in order to be involved in establishing that the situation is hopeless and that the patient means what he or she says.)”

The reply, therefore, is based on a well-intentioned and rational evaluation of what best serves the patient. But at the same time – and less intentionally – the reply will include: “We can help you from here on out, because you are altogether dispensable, and disposable, paltry as you are.” Barely anyone speaks with such outright callousness, but the point is what the patient hears in that resolute offer of assisted dying in the midst of his or her wretchedness?

In a country with a sustained ban on euthanasia the message might read: “You are requesting your own death. That is understandable, because you find yourself in a terrible predicament. We will do whatever we can for you, and we will also be with you now that things are so bad.”

The patient will repeat his or her wish to die perhaps, but the final barrier in law need not, as is sometimes claimed by rational minds, be merciless; rather, it can be an undertaking that we dare to be with the patient in there and our powerlessness, and that they must remain part of the community – that is this life.

I recently read a paper by a palliative care doctor, AJ Donkin, who said: “… an expression of a wish to die may be more a question than a statement: ‘Am I of any worth?’ ‘Am I in the way?’ Patients are looking for a picture of themselves in the eyes of their beholders. If the answer is returned that they should be helped to die, it is an affirmation of what they suspected – that others now see them as worthless.”

The Belgian oncologist Beuselinck said something in the same vein: “When patients no longer believe that their lives are worth living, this compels doctors to become judge of autonomy questions and of existential/mental suffering while seeking to resolve these problems through the administration of death. […] [Then] the doctor is acting outside his or her proper role and competence, both in relation to the indications, and in relation to the proposed solution.”

I seriously believe that it is important for the doctor to remain on the side of life when asked to help. It may sound a little pompous, but to bring things back down to earth, the doctor dares to be with the patient when things really take a turn for the worse without having some other agenda in the mix. 

Most people seem to oppose euthanasia on religious grounds. But your position is that there are more than enough “secular” reasons. Could you explain that?

I agree that religious “arguments” have played a part in the discussion of the issue of assisted dying and euthanasia. I do, however, not adhere to numinous arguments resting on, for example, the sanctity of life, that life is inviolate or that life is a gift. These lines of thought are metaphysical and easily become dogmatic and hence unconvincing. I expand upon this in my book.

Indeed, I believe that religious arguments can be detrimental to sober-minded thinking, because they are dogmatic rather than evidence based. If life is to be preserved at any price, for example, even futile treatment must be given and continued to absurdity.

There is a perception that the Catholic Church is always opposed to discontinuing treatment and this might even have prompted secular politicians to promote legalization of assisted dying in a wish to curb the influence of the church on citizens’ self-determination.

Together with a general confusion in distinguishing treatment cessation from taking life this may pave the way for drafting laws on euthanasia. Indeed, that mechanism may have been active in the recent plans for legalization in Spain and Portugal.

In my eyes the crucial arguments against a law on euthanasia are secular in nature and are specifically based on demonstrating that the customary arguments in favour of euthanasia (avoidance of unbearable suffering and respect for the right to self-determination) are untenable.

Friday, November 26, 2021

A Medical Perspective on the assisted dying debate.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Canberra Times in Australia published an excellent opinion article by Dr Paul Jenkins titled: A Medical Perspective on the voluntary assisted dying debate. Jenkins writes:
For 2000 years physicians have rejected killing their patient as a means of relieving suffering and mental stress.

The most common reasons for people seeking euthanasia are loss of autonomy, loss of dignity and diminished quality of life, not unrelieved pain.

To be clear, consensual voluntary withdrawal of treatment is not euthanasia. Specialist palliative care, at home or in a hospice, provides staff experienced in pain relief and mental health care.

The long-term effects on the maintenance of caring, professional patient relationships of passing this legislation may include:
  • Loss of trust in the medical profession. 
  • Coercion by relatives to provide physician assisted suicide. 
  • The creep to involuntary euthanasia (Belgium legalised euthanasia for children in 2014). 
  • The gradual defunding of palliative care. 
  • Intimidation of practitioners and facilities who maintain a conscientious objection to euthanasia.
The World Medical Association, comprising 114 countries, has reiterated its strong commitment to the principles of medical ethics, and that utmost respect has to be maintained for human life. Therefore the WMA is firmly opposed to euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide.

The AMA's position is largely in line with that of the WMA. I urge the Legislative Assembly to reject any such legislation.

More articles on this topic:

  • The World Medical Association re-affirms its opposition to euthanasia and assisted suicide (Link).  
  • Australian Medical Association opposes bill to legalize euthanasia (Link).


Jersey (UK) is debating the legalization of euthanasia

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

I reported a few days ago that a group of Jersey physicians told the government that they oppose the legalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide. The physicians were informing a euthanasia debate that was scheduled in the Jersey State Assembly. Jersey is a self-governing Crown Dependency and the largest of the channel islands.

BBC news reported that the Jersey State Assembly voted in favour of debating proposals to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide. The BBC article stated that this is the first step in a process that would likely be completed in 2023. The BBC news article stated:

But this historic vote represents the beginning, rather than the end, of a process which might - or might not - eventually see assisted dying legalised in the island.

Detailed work will now begin to determine how assisted dying could be permitted while ensuring vulnerable people remain safe.

At least two more separate votes will be required before the law can be changed.
Deputy Richard Renouf, Minister for Health and Social Services, spoke against the proposals, saying:
"Safeguards can be built up and to the best of our ability, but none of them can be truly effective.

"None of them would truly protect patients who are going to become vulnerable if assisted dying were to be introduced."

This is the beginning, not the end of the debate. It is our hope that Jersey State Assembly members will listen to the voice of Dr Carol Davis, consultant in palliative medicine who said:

"Legalising assisted suicide and euthanasia is a seismic legal, ethical and moral change and it carries serious risks to society and particularly its most vulnerable members."
More information on this topic:

  • Doctors in Jersey oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide (Link).

Thursday, November 25, 2021

Swiss assisted suicide doctor does not support euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Erika Preisig
Erika Preisig is a doctor and president of assisted suicide organisation Lifecircle. She was recently asked in an interview, with Swissinfo, if Switzerland should allow euthanasia rather than assisted suicide? 

She answered NO and stated:
I don't want to kill anybody.
Preisig correctly differentiates assisted suicide, which is a self-administered suicide death from euthanasia, which is done by lethal injection, done by someone else.

Preisig explains how assisted suicide is possible in all medical conditions, except locked-in syndrome.

To  be clear, I don't support euthanasia or assisted suicide but Preisig's comments are contrary to the comments made by Dr Shavelson in a California court case. Shavelson argues that the California assisted suicide law discriminates against people with certain conditions because they are unable to "self-administer." The California court case, is attempting to permit euthanasia within the assisted suicide law.

Preisig didn't stop there. When asked if the Swiss system is better than the Netherlands system, she responds Yes and stated:

In my opinion, the Swiss model is the best option. Here, the patient has the final say on his/her life.

Doctors should not decide whether a life is not worth living. If doctors can give the injection, how can you be sure that this was really the patient’s wish?
Preisig is not consistent in her message. Concerning euthanasia (death by lethal injection) - how can you be sure that this was really the patient's wish? She also states:

People always talk about the slippery slope this could lead to and potential abuse. But this has never happened in Switzerland, nor in Canada, where euthanasia is legal. 

Preisig's statement about the slippery slope or potential abuse not happening in Switzerland or Canada is clearly a false statement. Canada  and Switzerland have expanded their reasons for allowing assisted suicide and euthanasia. 

Abuse of the law

In October 2019, a Geneva court gave a suspended sentence to the regional vice-president of EXIT, Pierre Beck, for assisting the suicide of an 86-year-old woman who was not sickAccording to Swissinfo, Beck admitted to acting beyond the criteria of the law but he said that he didn't regret his action and faced with a similar situation he would likely do it again.

Candice Lewis
In August 2016, Candice Lewis (25) while receiving treatment at a Newfoundland hospital was pressured to "request" an assisted death.

No one questions that Candice was very sick, but as Candice's mother told CBC news, the doctor pressured her to request physician-assisted death, Candice never asked for it.

Preisig then appears to contradict herself. She states:

Five years ago, I was charged with murder of a very old Swiss lady. She had been at a psychiatric ward for three months and was diagnosed with depression. I had a talk with her son, the chief of the nursing home where she was staying and her caretaker. But I couldn't find a psychiatrist for the assessment.

When you face a court case for murder, and you think you have done everything perfectly right…. you ask yourself, why am I putting myself through this? And you think, why don't I quit (laughter)? But there are so many people who trust me and need my help. This is why I keep going.
It is interesting that she does not recognize that it is impossible to confirm the elderly depressed lady with questionable competency and ability to consent was freely deciding to die. She then says people trust her to provide them the lethal drug cocktail for suicide and that is why she continues.

More articles on this topic:

  • Swiss assisted suicide deaths increase. Problems continue (Link).  
  • Switzerland approves assisted suicide for prisoners (Link). 
  • Nearly every suicide death at Swiss clinic are foreign patients (Link).

Wednesday, November 24, 2021

Italy's first assisted suicide is a disabled man.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

An ethics committee in the central Italian region of Marche has approved the first assisted suicide death, a man with quadriplegia known as Mario. 

I am particularly concerned that the Italian assisted suicide court decisions all concern people with disabilities.

An Italian court acquitted assisted suicide activists Marco Cappato and Mina Welby in the assisted suicide death of Davide Trentini who died in the April 2017 at the Dignitas assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland.

In December 2020, a Milan court acquitted Italian assisted suicide activist, Marco Cappato in the assisted suicide death of Fabiano Antoniani (known as DJ Fabo), who died in February 2017 at the Dignitas assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland.

Italian assisted suicide activists
Both assisted suicide deaths concerned people with disabilities. Davide Trentini was living with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and Fabiano Antoniani experienced a spinal cord injury in a serious car accident in June 2014.

Now, the first approved Italian assisted suicide death is a man with quadriplegia.

Italian court decisions appear to suggest that certain lives are not worth living.
 

Tuesday, November 23, 2021

Doctors in Jersey oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The BBC reported that a group of Jersey health professionals urged Jersey's health minister to not legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide. Jersey is a self-governing Crown Dependency and the largest of the channel islands. Jersey is currently debating legislation to legalize both euthanasia and assisted suicide.

The BBC reported that the health professionals letter stated:

 "We are concerned about the most vulnerable members of our society who may feel coerced into a decision they would not make if the law did not permit it."

"It is very hard for clinicians to diagnose unbearable suffering or to predict time to death accurately for many conditions,"

The letter concludes: "We will not participate should this be passed."

The BBC also reported that:

Dr Carol Davis, consultant in palliative medicine, said: "Legalising assisted suicide and euthanasia is a seismic legal, ethical and moral change and it carries serious risks to society and particularly its most vulnerable members."

Dr Tracy Arun-Castro expressed concern any legalisation of assisted dying could be extended to allow the euthanasia of children.

This is not the first time that Jersey has debated the legalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide.

Monday, November 22, 2021

Canadian Psychiatric Association's dangerous position on euthanasia (MAiD)

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Canadian Psychiatric Association (CPA) promulgated a dangerous position on (MAiD) euthanasia on February 10, 2020. Many leading members of the CPA stated that the MAiD position was not openly debated by the organizations membership.

Link to the CPA Position Statement on Medical Aid in Dying.

This position is even more concerning now that the federal government passed Bill C-7 allowing euthanasia for mental illness alone. The federal government appointed a committee to establish protocols for approving euthanasia for mental illness, a committee that is comprised of many of the same people who devised the dangerous CPA position on euthanasia for mental illness.

The most concerning parts of the CPA statement:

(2) Patients with a psychiatric illness should not be discriminated against solely on the basis of their disability, and should have available the same options regarding MAiD as available to all patients.
Section 2 suggests that patients with a psychiatric illness should have euthanasia made available to them in the same manner as patients with a physical condition or terminal illness. The problem is that there is no evidence that psychiatric illnesses are irremediable.
(3) Psychiatrists will be mindful of the medical ethical principles as they relate to MAiD. They should not allow personal opinion or bias to sway patients who wish to consider MAiD as an option for addressing irremediable conditions.
Section 3 ignores that patients with mental illness may be asking for euthanasia based on suicidal ideation that is related to their condition. A psychiatrist may not accept that the patient has an irremediable condition, nonetheless, section 3 pressures the psychiatrist not to intervene in the best interests of the patient.
(4) While psychiatrists may choose not to be involved with the provision of MAiD, patients requesting MAiD must be provided with information regarding available MAiD resources and the referral process.
Section 4 overrides the conscience rights of psychiatrists who are not willing to kill their patients, by essentially requiring them to refer patients to a psychiatrist who will kill their patient.

The CPA Position Statement on MAiD fails to mention the importance of suicide prevention, the effects of suicide contagion, and the risk that MAiD for mental illness will pose for marginalized and vulnerable peoples. The current CPA position shows a profound disregard for the most disadvantaged.

Further articles on this topic:

  • CCHR condemns euthanasia of mental health patients (Link).  
  • Providing or facilitating suicide is a betrayal of the fundamental ethos of psychiatry (Link).  
  • No to euthanasia for mental health. A personal story (Link).  
  • Should psychiatrists assist the suicide of their patients, even if it is legal? (Link). 
  • Mental health expert opposes euthanasia for mental illness based on personal experience (Link)  
  • Canada passes Bill C-7 permitting euthanasia for mental illness (Link).

The US assisted suicide lobby plans for expanding assisted suicide laws.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

For the past several years I have been writing about the assisted suicide lobby plans to expand assisted suicide in America. 

The US assisted suicide lobby is expanding assisted suicide laws by: eliminating waiting periods, eliminating the 6 month terminal prognosis, allowing nurses and other medical providers to approve and participate in assisted suicide, eliminating residency requirements, and expanding assisted suicide laws to allow euthanasia (death by lethal injection rather than lethal prescription).

Recently, a long time assisted suicide lobby leader expressed these changes as Medical Aid in Dying 3.0. He described the original Oregon and Washington State assisted suicide laws as Medical Aid in Dying 1.0. He then refers to the recent expansions of assisted suicide laws as Medical Aid in Dying 2.0. He then describes the recent court cases to further expand assisted suicide to euthanasia and then nationally as Medical Aid in Dying 3.0.

Medical Aid in Dying 2.0?

The first set of assisted suicide expansions included eliminating the 15-day waiting period and expanding who can prescribe and carry-out an assisted suicide death.

In July 2019 Oregon Governor Kate Brown expanded the assisted suicide law by signing Bill SB 0579 into law. This bill, essentially, eliminates the 15 day waiting period to die by assisted suicide, a safeguard that was mean't to assure that a person has an opportunity to change their mind.

Proponents of the bill argued that the bill only applies to people with less than 15 days to live, and yet, it is difficult to know when someone has less than 15 days to live.

This year, New Mexico passed assisted suicide Bill HB 47 further codifying the assisted suicide lobby's expansion plans. HB 47 did not require a 15 day waiting period but only required a 48 hour waiting period that can be waived if the health care provider believes that the person may be imminently dying. Therefore HB 47 technically allows a same day death.

New Mexico also expanded who could prescribe and participate in assisted suicide. HB 47 allowed non-physicians defined as "health care providers" to approve and prescribe lethal drugs. "Health care providers" includes physicians, licensed physician assistants, osteopathic physicians, or nurses registered in advanced practice. The assisted suicide lobby is expanding who can prescribe and participate since very few physicians are willing to assist a suicide.

Recently California passed assisted suicide expansion Bill SB 380, which among other things, allowed the waiting period to be waived when a person is nearing death.

Medical Aid in Dying 3.0?

In August I reported that the assisted death lobby is supporting a court case to expand assisted suicide to euthanasia in California. The case argues that some people with disabilities are unable to self-administer the lethal assisted suicide drugs. Therefore, based on the Americans with Disabilities Act, the court is being asked to permit euthanasia (doctor administered death) in these cases.

In September a California judge rejected a preliminary injunction to permit the plaintiffs in the case to die by euthanasia before the actual trial is heard. The court case continues but the plaintiffs cannot die by lethal injection before the court decision is final.

Permitting euthanasia is not an extension of the state assisted suicide law but rather it would require the court to legislate a new law, that being legalizing euthanasia, which is a form of homicide. 

The assisted suicide lobby is trying to legalize euthanasia via the court because they recognize that elected officials are not willing to legalize euthanasia by creating an exception to homicide in the law.

Since the inception of the first US assisted suicide law in the state of Oregon, the assisted suicide lobby has been trying to extend assisted suicide to all 50 US states. 

Last year I wrote about the attempt by the assisted suicide lobby to use Covid 19 guidelines to permit assisted suicide by telehealth (Link to the article). Assisted suicide by telehealth may extend approvals for assisted suicide to all 50 US states.

In late October, an assisted suicide lobby group, and Dr Nicholas Gideones, a doctor who prescribes assisted suicide drug cocktails, launched a court case to challenge the Oregon assisted suicide law residency requirement. The lawsuit has been filed in the federal court, claims that the residency requirement is unconstitutional.

If the assisted suicide lobby and Dr Gideones win their legal challenge to the Oregon state residency requirement then the Oregon assisted suicide law would apply to every American. This court case directly affects every state that protects people from assisted suicide.

I predict that the assisted suicide lobby will launch a few more court cases within the next year with the hope of further expanding assisted suicide in the US. One case might be to challenge the 6 month prognosis requirement while another might attempt to have assisted suicide defined as medical treatment.

This article only creates awareness. What is needed is a greater effort to expose and stop the expansion of assisted suicide in America.

Sunday, November 21, 2021

Euthanasia and infanticide promoting philosopher wins $1 Million dollar Berggruen prize

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

Peter Singer, who supports infanticide of newborns with disabilities and is the father of the animal rights movement, won the Berggruen prize a $1 million award given annually to a thinker whose ideas have “profoundly shaped human self-understanding and advancement in a rapidly changing world.”

Singer, the author of the book Practical Ethics, is the most controversial "ethicist" for his support of infanticide and euthanasia for people with disabilities and mental illess. More concerning than his ideas is the many people who "think" that he is right and follow his dangerous philosophy. 

The New York Times article by Jennifer Schuessler concerning Singer winning the Berggruen prize stated:
Not Dead Yet protest
Singer, 75, has also been a controversial figure, particularly among advocates for disabled people who have contended that his utilitarian analysis discounts the value of their lives. (In his 1979 book “Practical Ethics,” he argued that parents should have the right to end the lives of newborns with severe disabilities.) In 1999, his appointment at Princeton drew protest from the disability advocacy group Not Dead Yet, whose founder has called Singer “the most dangerous man on earth.”
Singer's philosophy should be rejected as dangerous, discriminatory and anti-human and 
I agree with the disability rights group Not Dead Yet that he is the most dangerous man on earth.

Singer justifies killing people based on utilitarianism. He believes that eliminatng humans with cognitive disabilities will lead to a great level of overall happiness.

Singer's philosophy is anti-human because the characteristics that make us truly human include human equality, caring for others and respecting human diversity. 

Every human should have an equal right to live because they are a member of the human family. When we denigrate and kill people with disabilities, babies requiring treatment and care and the elderly needing care and respect people do not become happier but rather people become cold, calculating killers.

More articles on Peter Singer:
  • Peter Singer promotes euthanasia for mental illness (Link).
  • Euthanizing children (Link).
  • Better off dead? What Peter Singer doesn't get about disability and euthanasia (Link).
  • Not Dead Yet urges Princeton University to denounce Peter Singer's comments and Call for his resignation (Link).
  • Euthanasia of newborns with disabilities and infanticide (Link).

Woman awakens from coma on the same day that life-support was to be withdrawn.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

I have listened, over the years, to many people who have contacted to discuss whether they should discontinue life-sustaining treatment for a person when they are the Power of Attorney for Personal Care.

Bettina Lerman
These are never easy discussions. In these circumstances I will listen to the concerns of the decision maker and ask questions to help them assess what the person would have wanted if they were capable of making the decision or discuss what is the best decision. I only discuss the issues, people have to make decisions for themselves.

Michelle Butterfield, reported for Global News on a 69-year-old Florida woman who came out of coma, related to COVID-19, on the same day as the family had agreed to remove her from life-support. Butterfield reported:
Bettina Lerman’s family had already made funeral arrangements and had picked out a casket and headstone for the 69-year-old woman. They were preparing to say goodbye after doctors said it didn’t look like she would ever wake up.

“We had a family meeting with the hospital because my mother wasn’t waking up. No matter what they (did), they couldn’t get her to wake up,” Andrew Lerman, Bettina’s son, told CNN. “They said that her lungs are completely destroyed. There’s irreversible damage — that it’s just not going to happen.”

The family was picking up her headstone on Oct. 29 when they received a call from the hospital.

“There’s nothing wrong. Your mother woke up,” the doctor told Andrew, more than four weeks after she was first placed on the ventilator.
Withdrawing life-sustaining treatment is different than euthanasia or assisted suicide. When asked, I will usually advise the person to ask for more time. Medical professionals are not always right and sometimes a person needs a little more time to awaken.

For instance, a few years ago, a close family member had a profound heart attack. Doctors urged her husband to withdraw life-sustaining treatment, telling him that she would not likely come out of coma, and if she did she would never be the same. 

Her husband insisted on continuing treatment. She not only came out of coma but she fully recovered and remains healthy today.

I am not suggesting that recovery is always possible, but patience and time can save lives.

Friday, November 19, 2021

Québec Doctor testifies that some Covid patients were euthanized rather than treated.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

A Québec inquest into Covid related deaths has uncovered more disturbing facts. In September I published an article from the testimony of an auxilary nurse claiming that many of the COVID 19 nursing home deaths were caused by abuse and neglect.

A Québec doctor told the inquest into Covid related deaths that many treatable patients actually died by euthanasia.

An article by Clara Descurninges for The Canadian Press reported on the testimony from Dr Vinh-Kim Nguyen who worked in the emergency room at the Jewish General Hospital during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Nguyen who had previously managed the Ebola pandemic for Doctors Without Borders told the inquiry that:

Patients who arrived from CHSLDs with heavy cases of COVID-19 were, according to him, “surprisingly well after a day or two of infusions or oxygen”. "By hydrating these patients, they recovered very easily,"

Dr Nguyen was sent to CHSLDs to work with their COVID-19 patients. Dr Nguyen testified that he found himself in a very different situation. Descurninges states:

Wanting to transfer patients to the hospital, he quickly discovered "the many obstacles" put in his way, while public health guidelines recommended keeping residents there.

For patients stuck in CHSLDs, the only measures available were often end-of-life respiratory distress protocols, or strong cocktails of drugs used to reduce suffering, he testified. “These are protocols that lead to death. […] It was in fact euthanasia,” he insisted.

“What really traumatized me was that I saw patients who didn't have to go there, they could have been treated."

Duscurninges also reported on the testimony from Dr. Réjean Hébert who told the inquest that 10% of patients at CHSLDs died of COVID-19 during this period. Dr Hébert is a specialist in gerontology and a professor in health policy evaluation at the University of Montreal testified that these deaths represented a "massacre" by "systematic ageism."

Dr Hébert referred to the management of healthcare in Québec as "administrative monsters" with reference to what he referred to as the six hierarchical levels of management.

The Québec inquest was established to investigate why from February 25 - July 11, 2020, Quebecers aged 70 and over accounted for 92% of deaths from COVID-19.

I have written several articles concerning COVID-19 deaths. I believe that with varying degrees, the same abuse neglect and euthanasia that occurred in Québec COVID-19 deaths also happened in other jurisdictions. The only difference is that Québec has established an inquest into these COVID-19 related deaths.

Further articles on this topic:

  • Canada's claim to value seniors and disabled people rings false during COVID-19 pandemic (Link). 
  • 43% of US COVID-19 deaths were nursing home residents (Link). 
  • Stealth euthanasia: How many seniors with COVID-19 were killed? (Link). 
  • 81% of Canada's COVID-19 deaths were long-term care residents (Link).