Three Netherlands euthanasia deaths are being investigated.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

An article, on June 23, by Senay Boztas, for the Guardian outlines several euthanasia deaths that are being investigated or prosecuted in the Netherlands.

EPC supporters will remember the case of the euthanasia death of a woman with dementia, in 2016, who resisted the lethal injection. Boztas explains:

...in August, a Dutch doctor will be the first prosecuted for failings, in a 2016 case, in which sedatives were put in a dementia patient’s coffee and her family asked to hold her down when she struggled against the euthanasia injection.

• Dutch doctor who euthanized woman without consent is being prosecuted (Link).

According to Boztas two other cases were investigated in 2017:

The two other cases, from 2017, involve a woman in her 60s with Alzheimer’s whom an independent consultant did not judge to be suffering badly enough, and another in her 80s with osteoarthritis and other problems who refused other treatment.

Boztas reports about another case in 2018. Boztas reported:

... prosecutors are investigating a doctor for failing to treat the case of a woman with “due diligence” last year. According to the report, a woman in her 70s with depression had been operated on for abdominal problems when surgeons found evidence of lung cancer. She approached her doctor, saying she was experiencing unbearable psychological suffering and wanted euthanasia. Her doctor’s colleague took on the case, but, the review committee said, failed to obtain a second opinion from an independent psychiatrist, as is required.

Recently Wesley Smith wrote about nine couples that were euthanized together.

EPC explained that the 2018 Netherlands euthanasia statistics that the number of reported euthanasia deaths was down by 7%, likely related to the investigations by the Netherlands Prosecutor. We stated our concern that a new euthanasia category indicates that 205 people died by euthanasia based on multiple problems derived from the aging process. We fear that these deaths are based on "completed life."

The Netherlands euthanasia controversy continues. In January 2018, we learned that Berna van Baarsen, who had been a euthanasia assessor for 10 years, resigned over cases of euthanasia for dementia. In the same month,  Aurelia Brouwers (29) died by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons. even though she was physically healthy.

The euthanasia train left the station a long time ago in the Netherlands. Sadly, Canada is quickly riding the same euthanasia track and experiencing the same concerns.

Reject euthanasia. A culture that cares does not kill.

2018 Netherlands euthanasia deaths are lower. We are concerned about euthanasia for "completed life."

Alex Schadenberg
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Dutch media reported that, the 2018 euthanasia report indicates that there were 6126 reported euthanasia deaths in 2018 down from 6585 reported euthanasia deaths in 2017. 

Annemarie de jong, writing for the Nordhollands Dagblad, quoted Jacob Kohnstamm, the Chairman of the Regional Review Committee on Euthanasia, that the number of euthanasia deaths was "a fluctuation in the figures".

The article by de jong also suggests that there will be an increase in euthanasia deaths in 2019. She reported that the Nivel research institute stated:

It is striking that the number of euthanasia reports increased by 9 percent in the first quarter of 2019 compared to the same period last year

According to research 20% - 23% of the euthanasia deaths are not reported in the Netherlands. It is possible that some of the controversial euthanasia cases were simply not reported.

I am convinced that the lower number of reported euthanasia deaths is primarily related to the euthanasia cases that are being prosecuted in the Netherlands and Belgium. Doctors simply don't want to be brought before a tribunal or court to justify why they lethally injected a patient.

The number of euthanasia deaths for dementia and psychiatric problems also declined in 2018 while a new category of death causes me concern. The Dutchnews.nl reported:

Of the cases reported to the committee last year, 146 concerned people with dementia and 67 people had severe psychiatric problems. In 205 cases, patients had multiple problems derived from the ageing process.

In 2017, 169 people died by euthanasia for dementia (3 were advanced dementia) and 83 people died by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons.

The 205 people who had multiple problems derived from the aging process were part of a new category: "the completed life."

• She was euthanized without consent in the Netherlands.

There were several controversial Netherlands euthanasia stories in 2018.

In August 2017, a 5 year study sponsored by the Netherlands government showed significant increases in assisted deaths and continued abuse of the law.

In January we learned that Berna van Baarsen, who had been a euthanasia assessor for 10 years, resigned over cases of euthanasia for dementia.

In January, Aurelia Brouwers (29) died by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons. She was physically healthy.

In March we learned that the public prosecutor was investigating several controversial euthanasia deaths. The public prosecutor was also investigating a euthanasia group in the Netherlands after the death of a 19-year-old woman.

In July a Dutch doctor was reprimanded in the euthanasia death of a woman with dementia who had resisted.

In November, the Dutch doctor who euthanized a woman with dementia who had resisted, was prosecuted.

The euthanasia train left the station a long time ago in the Netherlands. Sadly, Canada is quickly riding the same euthanasia track and experiencing the same concerns.

Euthanasia was sold to the public as an "option" for people who are nearing death and suffering. It was then promoted for people who are not nearing death and fear possible future suffering. It was then extended to children and people with dementia. Finally it has extended to anyone who claims to have a "completed life."

Reject euthanasia. A culture that cares and not kills is the only way to go.

Child euthanasia has claimed the lives of three in Belgium

This article was published by Aleteia.org on August 27, 2018.

An ethicist in Antwerp expresses alarm that the practice of terminating the lives of seriously ill minors is going mainstream.

John Burger

By John Burger

A recent report in Belgium noted that legal euthanasia there has claimed the lives of three children in the past two years.

The response in Belgium? A big yawn.

“The report of the control commission has provoked not one article in the press, and no comments at all,” said Willem Lemmens, Professor of Modern Philosophy and Ethics at the University of Antwerp.

Lemmens was referring to a July 17 report from the commission that regulates euthanasia in Belgium, which noted that between January 1, 2016, and December 31, 2017, Belgian physicians gave lethal injections to three children under 18. In 2014, Belgium amended its already permissive euthanasia law to allow children of any age to request the procedure.

Euthanasia deaths in Belgium have risen from 2,021 in 2015 to 2,309 in 2017.

Richard Egan: Child euthanasia in the Netherlands and Belgium.

Charles Lane, writing for the Washington Post, reported that the three euthanasias of children included an 11-year-old who had cystic fibrosis (CF).

“This congenital respiratory disease is incurable and fatal, but modern treatments enable many patients to enjoy high quality of life well into their 30's or even beyond,” Lane wrote. “Median life expectancy for new CF cases in the United States is now 43 years, according to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.”

The others were a 17-year-old with Duchenne muscular dystrophy and a 9-year-old with a brain tumor.

“Doctors must verify that a child is ‘in a hopeless medical situation of constant and unbearable suffering that cannot be eased and which will cause death in the short term.’ After a child makes his or her wish for euthanasia known, in writing, child psychiatrists conduct examinations, including…intelligence tests, to determine that the youngster is capable and ‘not influenced by a third party’. Parents can, however, prevent the request from being carried out.”

But Lane was unconvinced. “What, exactly, convinced doctors that these children’s cases were hopeless, that their deaths were imminent—and that the kids fully understood not only euthanasia but also the treatment options that might have alleviated their condition?” he asked.

“These questions are no longer asked in the Belgian press,” Lemmens said.

In an interview on Friday, Lemmens said he sees a process of normalization going on in Belgium. “On the one hand, people take it more and more for granted for somatic diseases like cancer, or terminal diseases of neurological origin…And there’s discussion going on whether the law will be enlarged for people with dementia or for elderly who are not terminal but are just tired of living.”

Most of Belgium’s 4,337 euthanasias in 2016-2017 involved adults with cancer.

And yet, Lemmens reports, doctors overall are, “Very concerned and very eager to address needless suffering at the end of life, and some doctors really try to avoid euthanasia. They don’t like the procedures for it. If they apply palliative sedation they don’t need to go through all these procedures that the law requires.”

Palliative sedation is the use of narcotics to the point of suppressing the body’s respiratory system. The controversial practice relieves pain, but usually hastens death.

“There’s a discussion about the proper way to do palliative sedation,” he said. “The pro-euthanasia doctors will say that palliative sedation is always a means to hasten death in a way that is not so different from euthanasia. The only difference is that with palliative sedation the doctors avoid external control and act, according to pro-euthanasia doctors, in a paternalistic way. These discussions are going on between doctors, and I think the discussions prove there has been an increase in what I would call a gray zone in end of life practices.”

But Lemmens rejects the idea that the overall care for dying patients in Belgium is decreasing. “Overall, Belgium has quite a good health system,” he said.

He affirmed that there is pressure on Catholic hospitals to cooperate with euthanasia requests, partly due to the mergers between Catholic and secular institutions in recent years and the secularization of Belgian culture. The euthanasia law does allow an objecting physician to opt out, but it’s generally expected for such a physician to refer a patient to another doctor, even though the law does not require it.

Alex Schadenberg: Belgium euthanized three children aged 9, 11 and 17.

Alex Schadenberg

For Alex Schadenberg, Executive Director of the London, Ontario-based Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, the mass media has been complicit in the advance of Belgium’s euthanasia laws. “The more cases that get promoted through the media, the worse it will become," he said. “Recently there was a case in the Netherlands of Aurelia Brouwers, a 29-year-old who died by euthanasia. She was physically healthy but was going through psychiatric issues. She intentionally went to the media; she became a media darling before she died in January this year. And the reason was: the more we hear about it, the more it is considered acceptable. What someone would never think of doing in the past, once we hear of others doing it, suddenly it becomes acceptable for somebody to do this.”

What troubles Schadenberg about Belgium’s euthanasia law is that even a 9-year-old’s “consent” to a doctor euthanizing him is accepted. “I don’t know how capable my 9-year-old was about consent, and now we’re talking about death,” he said. “In law we recognize there are limits to consent, for these very reasons, that there’s a certain level of ability, and yet we’re allowing death to be done in these cases.”

Schadenberg said child euthanasia is being talking about it in Canada right now. He said that in 2016 the government instituted committees to look at child euthanasia, euthanasia for people with dementia, and euthanasia for people with psychiatric conditions alone. “We’re expecting the reports in December,” he said. “I’m assuming that euthanasia for children will be considered very seriously.”

Fatal Flaws (euthanasia) film strikes a raw human nerve.

This article was written by Deborah Gyapong and published in the Catholic Register on August 9, 2018.

The Fatal Flaws film and pamphlets can be purchased (Link) and the Fatal Flaws Film can be purchased and downloaded (Link). (Fatal Flaws promo below).

Kevin Dunn first met Aurelia in the Netherlands at a conference on euthanasia for young people.

“I found this young woman who had psychological issues but was able-bodied, talking to me, smiling, laughing,” the filmmaker recalled.

Kevin Dunn with Aurelia.

It was the beginning of a relationship that ended tragically with her death by assisted suicide.

“It was the first person I knew who committed suicide, only somebody helped her do it,” said Dunn. “I saw a culture, a country, I saw people who were egging her on, saying ‘We believe you have that right.’ ”

Aurelia’s story is among many told in Dunn’s new documentary, Fatal Flaws: Legalizing Assisted Death. It was released in May in Ottawa and has been drawing large crowds in locations where it has been screened, most recently, in Hamilton, Ont.

In Guernsey, U.K., Dunn was able to arrange two screenings before the island’s Parliament voted May 18 on a euthanasia bill. An MP who supported euthanasia was present at one screening. After seeing the film, he changed his mind, spoke up in Parliament and the bill was defeated, Dunn said.

• Fatal Flaws film will change the way you view assisted death.

Fatal Flaws, co-produced by Dunn Media and the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, is Dunn’s second film on euthanasia.

He admits the stories uncovered were personally “heartbreaking.” He encountered families dealing with the unwanted euthanasia of beloved family members in Belgium and the Netherlands, where euthanasia has been legal since 2002.

He saw the pressure being applied to Candace Lewis, a young disabled woman in Newfoundland, to opt for assisted suicide instead of pursuing treatment for an illness from which she eventually recovered.

Aurelia’s story was especially sad for Dunn, who remembers well his first meeting with the 29-year-old.

“I didn’t pretend to know what her life was like with her psychological illness,” he said. 

“She was fighting for others for access and for her own, which she could not get from her own GP,” he said.

In the film, Aurelia and Dunn continue to connect, including subsequent conversations via Skype.

Aurelia told him, “I don’t seek to end my life; I seek to end my suffering.”

Dunn told her that if she was encouraged to obtain euthanasia, “we’ve abandoned you as a culture.”

“I spoke to her two weeks before a doctor ended her life,” Dunn said. “I was broken after I found out she had received her request. She had it granted outside of the system through an end-of-life clinic.”

Dunn remembers “there were celebrities coming to visit her in the end, to cheer her on in her decision. How far gone are we as a culture where we’re cheering someone on to their demise?

“Shouldn’t we be doing everything we possibility can with the best psychiatric help, the best pain management, as opposed to saying ‘This is what you want … we support you?’ ” he asked. 

“True compassion says I’m going to walk with you until the end,” he said. “Compassion never abandons people. … When we embrace these laws, we embrace abandonment.”

More than 3,700 people have died via assisted suicide since it became legal in Canada in June 2016.

There are already pressures for the country to adopt advanced directives for those with dementia diagnoses, for consent by “mature minors” and for euthanasia for those with psychiatric illnesses who, like Aurelia, were otherwise able-bodied. “This incremental expansion of the laws is out of control,” Dunn said.

Dunn said his biggest surprise in making the documentary was finding out even the “most staunch advocates in Belgium and the Netherlands are concerned about where these laws are headed.”

In the Netherlands, there is a bill before Parliament that would allow people who are “weary of life” to get access to a doctor’s prescription to end their lives.

Architects of euthanasia laws for those in extreme pain at the very end of life are now fighting against the extension of these laws to able-bodied, healthy people, he said.

Dunn hopes his next film project will be on another subject other than euthanasia, though he will continue to document individual stories as they arise.

“These stories stick with me,” Dunn said. “Talking with these people who have suffered so greatly by these laws or have been tricked by these laws. I carry them with me. 

“I’m hoping to take a bit of a rest from it,” he said.

Dunn says all Canadians have a role to play in preventing euthanasia, even beyond applying pressure on governments for better palliative care.

“We can put down our phones and we can go visit our aged mother, our aged father, someone at a nursing home,” Dunn said. “As simple or altruistic as it sounds, be the reason for somebody’s tomorrow.”

For more information go to: fatalflawsfilm.com

FATAL FLAWS: a must see doc on assisted suicide and euthanasia

This film review was published by Richard Egan on his blog.

Fatal Flaws is a newly released film by Kevin Dunn on euthanasia and assisted suicide laws.

As its title suggests the movie documents real flaws in these laws that pose fatal risks to the elderly, the disabled, the mentally ill and, indeed, all of us.

In a series of interviews with doctors and advocates on both sides of the issue Dunn’s conversational technique draws out the underlying viewpoints that characterize the pro and anti assisted suicide/euthanasia positions.

• Fatal Flaws film will change the way you view assisted death. Order yours today. (Link)

On the pro assisted suicide side it becomes clear that there are in fact two drivers which only partially overlap. Firstly there is the so-called principle of autonomy which affirms, effectively without limit, a person's right to demand and to be given assisted suicide or euthanasia for any reason at all.

This is the basis on which advocates and politicians in the Netherlands are now proposing euthanasia for completed life. This is a far cry from the original justification of intolerable suffering. Watch the Fatal Flaws preview (below).

It also underlies the heartbreaking story of Aurelia Browers, a young Dutch woman who had struggled for many years with depression and suicidal thoughts. Dunn warms to her enthusiastic, seemingly bubbly personality and seeks to offer her hope. However, in the death affirming culture of the Netherlands, her “choice” to despair of life is affirmed and she was euthanased on 26 January 2018 by doctors from the End of Life Clinic.

The second principle is the view that many people would simply be better off dead. This principle is shown by Dunn's interviews to operate often independently from any requirement for an autonomous request for euthanasia.

In Canada, a young disabled woman, Candice Lewis, was encouraged – or rather bullied – by a doctor to agree to euthanasia. Candice had to endure hearing a doctor talking to her mum about killing her.

In the Netherlands two middle aged women talk about attempts by doctors to kill their mothers without any request from the mothers. In one case the daughter was able to intervene in time and her mother lived long enough – another year – to see her second great grandchild. Sadly in the other case the mother was dead by the time the daughter got to the hospital. The mother had been told she was being given an injection to help her sleep but was in reality a lethal injection without request or consent.

With Victoria Australia's assisted suicide and euthanasia law set to go into effect on June 19, 2019 and an inquiry into end of life choices set to report in Western Australia in August 2018 it would be timely to order a copy of Fatal Flaws and arrange a screening for your friends, church group or community group.

So much discussion on assisted suicide and euthanasia is shallow and ill-informed. Viewing Fatal Flaws will equip you to make an informed contribution to the debate.

Order the film Fatal Flaws for $40 for 1 DVD or $100 for 3 DVD's.

Order the Fatal Flaws pamphlet for $40 for 100 pamphlets or $100 for 300 pamphlets.

The pamphlet re-enforces the Fatal Flaws stories.

Fatal Flaws can be ordered at: (Link)

There is no extra fee for a public screening.

Fatal Flaws: A Canadian film chronicles the march of euthanasia.

This article was published by Mercatornet on May 14, 2018. (edited for length)

By Denyse O'Leary

I first became interested in euthanasia in 1972 when I unexpectedly received a letter from a Florida death with dignity group, in connection with a public plea for the euthanasia of a child who had Down syndrome.

I recalled that letter while watching the international film premiere, in Ottawa on May 8, of Fatal Flaws, (promo on right) a film by Canadian broadcaster Kevin Dunn. As host and narrator, he asks, are euthanasia and assisted suicide laws leading society down a dangerous path? In partnership with the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, the film looks at selected cases from the Netherlands, Belgium, the United States, and Canada.

• Fatal Flaws film will change the way you view assisted death. Order yours today.

The Netherlands is among the most advanced euthanasia countries. Dutch cases recounted in Fatal Flaws include an elderly woman who was pressured to accept euthanasia. But her daughter Helen heard of it and got a second medical opinion which revealed that her mother was not even in danger of dying of natural causes at that time. She passed away peacefully a year later, among family and friends.

Margreet, (video on right) however, lost her mother to euthanasia without request. The circumstances made me wince. My own mother had had a similar illness, a virulent, fast-acting pneumonia, several years before euthanasia was legal in Canada. She recovered, with emergency treatment, and lived another reasonably pleasant five years. In a euthanasia-positive environment, her life might have ended that winter night.

• Organize a screening of Fatal Flaws in your community.

On a cheerier note, Newfoundlander  Candice Lewis, 26, (video on right) who lives with cerebral palsy, was pressured by her doctor to ask for assisted death. Her mother took her home instead and a whole Down East community pitched in to help, restoring her to her normal life. But, one is left to wonder, what is euthanasia doing to the medical profession?

The most arresting case was Aurelia, the Dutch girl whose psychiatric problems included a fixation on dying. Despite Dunn’s (and others’) best efforts to help her, she was euthanized January 26, 2018, a poster child for euthanasia for psychiatric reasons. It’s hard to see how things could have turned out this way if lethal injection were not simply one of life’s many choices in the post-modern Netherlands.

The death with dignity group that contacted me in 1972 and its many successors have achieved much but they are only just beginning. As Dunn puts it, “Almost every country in the world is discussing some form of legalization and America is “at a tipping point.” Now and then the euthanasia and assisted suicide campaigners face setbacks. Recently, the American Medical Association restated its objection to assisted suicide, rejecting the claim that it somehow isn’t “suicide,” a big talking point with the campaigners. Indeed, progress is stalling as Americans realize that the Netherlands is their future if the vote is yes.

But medical acceptance of euthanasia is not only what American opponents most fear. They also fear a Supreme Court decision that sweeps aside all laws against assisting to kill another human being, where consent is offered. That has already happened in Canada. Not only are the numbers rising swiftly, but doctors are increasingly asked about child euthanasia. And according to one survey, most Quebec caregivers approve euthanasia for dementia patients without their consent. Given the sharp progressive tilt of the American bar and bench, the Americans interviewed have every reason to worry.

Five percent of deaths in the Netherlands, we are told, are now attributed to euthanasia. Euthanasia for anyone on request is currently debated for all adults (“completion of life”). And why not? If death is a good or at least neutral thing, why should anyone be denied? Why should those who can’t consent be denied? Why shouldn’t doctors who are unwilling to kill, be compelled to refer for death, as they now are in Ontario, Canada?

The Netherlands opposition, as recorded in the film, amounts to feeble, apologetic peeps from people with little influence in an emphatically post-Christian culture. I was unimpressed with the early campaigner for euthanasia, Boudewijn Chabot, who mumbles about a “worrisome culture shift” in which euthanasia is “‘getting out of hand.” Given the cultural drivers, there was no possibility that it would turn out any other way. He is partly responsible for the change, whether he chooses to embrace it or not. One struggles to remember that, during the Nazi occupation in World War II, 6,200 doctors went on strike against the “deportation of the insane and sick persons [to death camps] and the sterilization of healthy people.”

And what of the other side in those days? Spencer Tracy, as judge Dan Haywood ) in Judgment at Nuremberg, ponders how the deaths of millions proceeded from the Nazi medical euthanasia program in the 1930s) in orderly steps. He says, “Herr Janning, it came to that the first time you sentenced a man to death you knew to be innocent.”

Cultures can change fast and hard. No one watches that kind of stuff anymore. Opponents of euthanasia, as portrayed in the film, think and speak in a way that no longer communicates effectively. That is not their fault. It is hard to know how they could communicate effectively. They argue rationally, citing evidence and precedent, among people whose education has taught them to reject, as a matter of duty, the rigors of rational thinking and the demands of evidence and to do what feels right to them at given time.

“Care, don’t kill” is the film’s urgent plea. But, to a post-modern, killing someone who seems to want or need it is the ultimate act of caring. And in that, post-moderns are consistent. If a woman can show her baby love by having the baby dismembered alive in an abortion, she can also show a surviving child love later by having him lethally injected if he has a disability.

Fundamental assumptions about human life have changed in recent decades. Over 40% of Americans today believe that humans are not special. The cultural revolution that would overturn such an assumption is nowhere in sight. Quite the contrary. In the Western world, many are gradually losing touch with traditional reasons to avoid suicide or euthanasia, typically religion, philosophy, family, or lifelong friends, in favour of transient, fungible relationships. Are you old enough to remember when divorce was a legal problem? When people worried about the effect of daycare on infants? Or of promiscuity?

As things unfold, opposition to euthanasia will likely come to be seen the way that opposition to abortion increasingly is: a sort of hate crime, an injustice against those who wish euthanasia for themselves or for a dependent person. Suicide hotlines will be pressured, if not compelled, to tell callers that they can have medical assistance in dying if they wish, just as pro-life pregnancy counselling services are pressured or required today in a number of jurisdictions to advertise abortion. In any event, many people will feel that they should not have to endure unpleasant, moralistic opposition to their possible choices.

What to do? If more jurisdictions adopt the Ontario approach and eliminate conscientious objection, patients will soon lack local access to doctors unwilling to help kill them, in an age when a rising senior population is challenging public healthcare systems across the world. No-kill medical facilities in jurisdictions that are not answerable to the euthanasia lobby may eventually be the only hope for dissenters from death.

The evening I went to the film, a New York Times article whistled past my desk, noting that states that inflict capital punishment are starting to use nitrogen gas rather than lethal injections because they are “hamstrung by troubles with lethal injection — gruesomely botched attempts, legal battles and growing difficulty obtaining the drugs.” Gruesomely botched attempts? We never hear about that in articles that promote euthanasia.

Fatal Flaws notes that the Dutch doctor who forcibly injected a woman who was struggling against him was exonerated. I hadn’t heard that either. Later, we won’t hear about such things because they won’t be news. And, after a few decades of euthanasia, no matter what else happens, Western society will be very different, and — one suspects — more sparsely populated, at least by Westerners.

Denyse O’Leary is an Ottawa-based author, blogger, and journalist.

Netherlands 2017 euthanasia deaths increase by another 8%

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The DutchNL news is reporting that the regional euthanasia review committee's annual report was released indicating that 6585 assisted deaths were reported in 2017, increasing by 8% from 6091 reported assisted deaths in 2016.

• Netherlands 2016 euthanasia deaths increase by another 10%.

According to the DutchNL news, the number of assisted deaths for dementia or psychiatric reasons also increased in 2017, with 169 people dying by euthanasia for dementia (3 were advanced dementia) and 83 people dying by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons.  

In 2016 there were 141 people who died by euthanasia based on dementia, up from 109 in 2015 and 60 people who died by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons, up from 56 in 2015. 

In January 2017, a Netherlands euthanasia review committee decided that the death of a woman with dementia, who died by euthanasia against her will, was done in "good faith." The woman was held down while the doctor lethally injected her. On January 1, 2018, Berna van Baarsen, a euthanasia assessor for 10 years, resigned over the acceptance of euthanasia for dementia in the Netherlands. On January 26, 2018 a 29-year-old woman died by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons.

The DutchNL article indicated that 12 of the euthanasia deaths were questionable:

Twelve cases were labeled by the monitoring committee as not being carefully carried out – these were mainly problems with medical care or not having an independent second opinion.

The Netherlands euthanasia review committees are lying when they state that nearly all of the deaths are done according to the law. The fact is that they simply do not know how many assisted deaths occur outside of the law.

The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) (August 3, 2017) published a Netherlands study titled: End-of-Life Decisions in the Netherlands over 25 years.

• Netherlands euthanasia study uncovers abuse of the law.

The study indicates that in 2015 there were 7254 assisted deaths (6672 euthanasia deaths, 150 assisted suicide deaths, 431 terminations of life without request) in the Netherlands.

A woman in the Netherlands was interviewed for the upcoming Fatal Flaws Film  explaining how her mother died by euthanasia without request.

Since the Netherlands 2015 euthanasia report indicated that there were 5561 reported assisted deaths in 2015 and yet the data from the study indicated that there were 7254 assisted deaths in 2015. Therefore, based on the data from the study, 1693 (23%) of the assisted deaths were not reported.

The Netherlands euthanasia law uses a voluntary self-reporting system, meaning the doctor who lethally injects the patient also submits the report. Since doctors do not self-report abuse of the law, therefore the law enables doctors to cover-up "abuse" of the law. The 431 terminations of life without request are usually not reported.

Due to the design of the Netherlands law, it is impossible to know how many people actually die by an assisted death in the Netherlands. Sadly the Belgian and Canadian euthanasia laws contain the same Fatal Flaws as the Netherlands law.

Important articles on euthanasia in the Netherlands (2017):

• Psychiatrists comment on euthanasia for psychiatric reasons in the Netherlands.
• Netherlands euthanasia experts advocate for child euthanasia, with or without consent.
• New study casts doubt on effectiveness of euthanasia regulation in the Netherlands.
• Double euthanasia in the Netherlands.
• Netherlands 5 year study shows significant increases in assisted deaths and continued abuse of the law.
• Netherlands study. 431 people were killed without explicit request in 2015.
• Euthanasia pioneer provides new information concerning euthanasia for psychiatric reasons in the Netherlands.

Kevin Yuill - Assisted Dying: A failure of Psychiatry.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Kevin Yuill

Kevin Yuill, who is an academic who has written extensively about euthanasia and assisted suicide wrote an interesting article that was published by Spiked titled: Assisted Dying: A failure of Psychiatry.

In his article, Yuill comments on the death of Aurelia Brouwers, the 29-year-old Dutch woman who died by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons and the research by Fabian Stahle, from Sweden, uncovering hidden problems with the Oregon assisted suicide law.

Yuill comments on Brouwer's death:

Brouwers had carefully planned her death – in her pyjamas, listening to Hugh Laurie, with her beloved pink T-Rex cuddly toy, Dido – ‘[he] has been my support since I was four-years-old’, as Aurelia put it. She asked her parents to care for Dido, who is to get ‘a spot on the coffin’ at her funeral. 

Brouwers told an interviewer: ‘I think that after such a rotten life I am entitled to a dignified death – people who have a serious illness get a chance for a worthy ending, so why is it so difficult for people who are psychologically ill?’

• 29-year-old Dutch woman scheduled to die by assisted death for psychological reasons. 

Yuill asks the question: at what stage do psychiatric professionals admit defeat and sanction the death of a patient? Yuill states

In the Netherlands as it stands, nine per cent of requests for euthanasia due to ‘unbearable’ and ‘hopeless’ psychological suffering are granted, although it is rare that the patients are as young as Brouwers. Brouwers had decided long ago that her treatment was not working and that her suffering was too great to bear. And her doctors eventually gave her the green light. But when is psychological suffering deemed ‘unbearable’? When is it adjudged ‘hopeless’? These seem to be incredibly subjective criteria.

Yuill challenges the UK assisted dying group Dignity in Dying who have stated that Brouwers would not qualify for assisted death based on the proposed UK legislation.

In the UK, Dignity in Dying and other campaigners for assisted dying insist that cases like Brouwers’ could never happen under their proposed legislation. Citing assisted-dying legislation in Oregon, they claim that similarly ‘robust safeguards’ would be implemented in the UK, preventing cases similar to Brouwers’. 

But, if assisted dying is legalised, is it realistic to expect ‘autonomy’ and ‘compassion’ to be reserved only for those who suffer from life-shortening physical diseases? Although Dignity in Dying denies it, assisted-dying laws are always extended beyond their original justifications. Indeed, in every nation where euthanasia has been legalised, the parameters in which assisted dying is permitted eventually always stretch beyond those with ‘less than six months to live’.

Yuill comments on the recent research by Fabian Stahle, into the Oregon assisted suicide law based on the proposed safeguards in the UK as being similar to the Oregon assisted suicide law:

Stahle had asked the Oregon Health Authority whether a diabetic person who was only dying because they refused treatment would qualify for an assisted death. The OHA’s answer was a straight ‘yes’, and it admitted that this had always been the case. 

Indeed, Oregon oncologist Dr Charles Blanke noted a difficult case regarding a young woman with Hodgkin’s lymphoma who had a 90 per cent chance of survival with treatment but refused it. Blanke acceded to her demand for an assisted death, despite the fact she was likely to lose potentially ‘seven decades’ of life. Opportunities for self-induced terminal illness are numerous. Anyone with anorexia nervosa, for example, can bring themselves to a terminal condition, thus qualifying for an assisted death in Oregon. 

... In Oregon, for example, pain does not figure in the top five reasons why citizens choose assisted death. Instead, it is fear that dominates the reasoning of those seeking to end their lives: fear of not being able to participate in enjoyable activities; fear of loss of autonomy; fear of loss of physical capabilities; fear of loss of dignity; and fear of being a burden. Fear, however, is curable, even if the underlying physical condition is not.

• Oregon Health Authority reveals hidden problems with the Oregon assisted suicide model.

Yuill ends his article by recognizing how legalizing assisted suicide corrupts society:

... But when society legalises assisted dying, it surely corrupts the fundamental belief in the value of life that underlies all medical treatment. Compassion in the past meant doing what we felt was best for a patient. It meant disagreeing with a suicidal patient who felt her life was worthless. Today, compassion seems to mean respecting someone’s requests, even when we don’t feel that those requests are in his or her best interests. As Brouwers declared in her blog in January: ‘Respect that I will die Friday.’ 

Brouwers’ sad case is a grim reminder that a society that sanctions suicide is a society that has given up on certain people. It is a society that has lost its moral bearings. An individual may lose all hope and may feel that life is no longer worth living. She may even take her own life, and there is little we can do to prevent that. But, surely, if a fellow human being expresses the wish to die, we must be loyal to her life, not her wishes.

Kevin Yuill teaches American studies at the University of Sunderland. His book, Assisted Suicide: The Liberal, Humanist Case Against Legalisation, is published by Palgrave Macmillan.

Psychiatrists comment on euthanasia for psychiatric reasons in the Netherlands

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

It is very upsetting to write about the assisted death for psychiatric reasons of Aurelia Brouwers, the 29-year-old physically healthy Dutch woman. Aurelia died, as scheduled, on January 26. 

I did not know Aurelia, personally, but I communicated with her and I urged her to live. I told her that I cared about her.

• 29 year old Dutch woman scheduled to die an assisted death for psychiatric reasons.

Aurelia made her assisted death a campaign to promote euthanasia for psychiatric reasons.

Arjen ten Cate and Ingrid Willems published an interesting article in Destentor.nl examining the attitudes of psychiatrists towards psychiatric euthanasia. ten Cate and Willems interviewed four psychiatrists.

Frank Koerselman, an emeritas professor of psychiatry, opposes euthanasia for psychiatric reasons. Koerselman states: (google translated)

The... Netherlands is completely wrong when it comes to euthanasia. He calls it a slippery slope. "Only when euthanasia became possible in physical medicine did we start developing good palliative care. That is the reverse order? Now the same thing happens in psychiatry. There is no policy for chronic patients, but we do allow euthanasia. '' 

Koerselman is convinced that psychiatric patients can not make a sober, intellectual decision whether or not to live. "There are always emotions like fear, shame or anger. It is an illusion with the syndrome to think that such a decision is well-considered.''

Koerselman, who stated that he is definitely not religious, stated:

psychiatrists can not judge this. For even psychiatrists are not able to look into the patient's head in such a way that he or she can judge whether a death wish is justified. "We overestimate ourselves as a professional group."

Menno Oosterhoff, who knew Aurelia personally and who lives with compulsive disorder, is a psychiatrist who supports euthanasia for psychiatric reasons. The article states (google translated):

it is not up to the masses, or a professional group to give an opinion on one specific patient. ,, Only the patient himself, his doctor and psychiatrist can make a good estimate.

According to Oosterhoff there are too many prejudices about people with psychological problems who have a death wish. "That they have a lack of willpower is such a preconception. People's prejudices tend to be more difficult when it comes to an individual person. If you know Aurelia's story yourself. She is terminal because her soul is failing. There are too many theoretical objections to euthanasia."

Jim van Os is a professor of psychiatry who does not oppose euthanasia but is concerned that it may become too common:

There are examples of patients with a very strong death wish, who asked for euthanasia and did not get it and now a happy one life, because they have found the love of their lives, for example.

Van Os is worried about the growing demand for euthanasia in psychiatry. He does not want to go into the specific case 'Aurelia'. "But in a general sense you may wonder if we have done enough to help these people." ... How is it that someone wants to die? Should we have been unable to do something at an earlier stage? "This professor also notes that the GGZ in the Netherlands is under pressure due to cutbacks. Dangerous, he says. GGZ Nederland does not want to accept this criticism.

Psychiatrist Bram Baker, who had a friend who died by euthanasia for psychiatric reasons, set up a signature campaign opposing euthanasia for psychiatric suffering. According to the article:

He is critical: "Legally, it is allowed. But a judgment about psychic, unbearable suffering is always subjective. You can not take a position as a psychiatrist, that is very scary. And I think euthanasia is going too far. Is there no other option?

Several excellent articles have been published opposing euthanasia for psychiatric reasons.

• How many botched cases will it take to end euthanasia of the mentally ill.
• Belgian psychiatrists, psychologists and academics demand debate on euthanasia for psychological suffering.
• Distinguishing between sadness and depression at the end-of-life.
• Canadian Mental Health Association opposes euthanasia for Psychiatric reasons.
• American Psychiatric position on euthanasia.
• Suicide is a symptom of mental illness not a cure for it.
• Belgium: Euthanizing the mentally ill.
• Mentally ill OK'd for assisted suicide in California hospitals.
• Killing the mentally ill in the Netherlands.
• Study uncovers concern with the practice of euthanasia and assisted suicide.