Assisted suicide to be debated in Britain.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

A parliamentary debate to legalize assisted suicide in the UK was spawned by a petition to parliament. According to Yahoo News:

Assisted dying will be debated in the House of Commons today, after a petition calling for its legalisation reached the required number of 100,000 signatures.

Yahoo News quoted from Dr Henry Marsh, a brain surgeon in the UK who is living with terminal cancer and supports assisted suicide, and Dr Mark Pickering from the campaign group Care Not Killing Alliance. Pickering told Yahoo News that:

Many of the heartbreaking stories that we hear driving the assisted suicide debate are of people who sadly did not get the right palliative care, and did not have access to the best support at the time of their dying or their loved ones dying. We really need to fix that.

Tanni Grey-Thompson

A bill to legalize assisted suicide was defeated in the House of Lords by a vote of 179 to 145. During that debate, members of the House of Lords with disabilities spoke out against assisted suicide.

Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson stated during the debate:

...hundreds of people – from both sides of the argument – had written to her about the amendment, which would – if passed – “fundamentally change the political and societal landscape for disabled people”.

“If people have not read it, they should look at the article by… Lord Shinkwin this weekend about how disabled people are encouraged to think that they would be better off dead than live with an impairment.

“Even in this chamber, we hear about things such as incapacity and incontinence and all the things that people fear.

“I push back on that, and I push back on the view that public opinion is overwhelmingly in support of this.”

The All Party Parliamentary Group for Dying Well promotes access to excellent care at end of life and stands against the legalisation of doctor assisted suicide in the UK.