Paul Russell: A statement we should all fear.

The article was published on the HOPE Australia website on March 4, 2015.

By Paul Russell 

The director of HOPE Australia and Vice Chair - EPC International

The theory and the practice of euthanasia simply don’t match and the rhetoric and reality are miles apart.

Dutch activist Dr Rob Jonquiere, head of the world body pressing for euthanasia, is in New Zealand peddling euthanasia up and down the country.

He has said some outrageous things, some of which I tackle below. But the most outrageous statement, one that we should all fear, he gave recently to the New Zealand media:

"Sometimes the only way to terminate the suffering is to take away the life."

‘What’s so outrageous about that?’ you may ask. Well, perhaps those who are used to hearing pro-euthanasia peddlers talking about people dying in pain might not notice immediately. But Jonquiere is not talking about pain, he’s talking about suffering. There’s a significant difference; one that should ring alarm bells.

Euthanasia leader challenges, disability rights leader, Catherine Frazee, concerning euthanasia.

Catherine Frazee

Dr Rob Jonquiére, the communications director for the World Federation of Right to Die Societies, challenged the position of Catherine Frazee in her recent article opposing euthanasia.

Dr Jonquiére appears to be very proud of the work he did instituting the euthanasia law in the Netherlands. He is convinced that all is well with euthanasia in the Netherlands. But does he have an objective ear?

Dr Jonquiére states that decisions concerning euthanasia: 

must defined from a - subjective - peronal point of view. 

This means that a person who is at a low point in their life, and considers their life to have lost meaning, would qualify for euthanasia. This belief is not a "freedom to choose death" but rather an abandonment of a person when they are in need of human support.

Jonquiére stated that: 

an inborn loathing with any doctor for termination of life of one of his patients have shown to be the major reason for careful implementation of the Dutch Law since its start in 2002.

I agree that doctors, and people in general, have an inborn loathing for termination of life but inborn loathing, or as some call it, human nature, has a way of weakening its natural inclinations when a person consistently contravenes what is inborn. 

This may be why in the Netherlands: 

● 45 psychiatric assisted deaths occurred in 2013. 

● Dr Jonquiére's friend, psychiatrist Dr Boudewijn Chabot recently stated that the Netherlands euthanasia law has derailed. 

● The 2012 Netherlands euthanasia statistics showed that there were 13% more reported euthanasia deaths in 2012. The number of reported assisted deaths were 4188 in 2012, up from 1923 in 2006. 

● The number of unreported assisted deaths increased from 20% in 2005 to 23% in 2010. Studies from Belgium prove that doctors who abuse the law often do not report the death.  

● a healthy woman who was becoming blind recently died by euthanasia. Jonquiére must not have considered this case when stating that Frazee's fear of societal detriment has not occurred in the Netherlands. 

Jonquiére also ignores the Groningen Protocol that allows euthanasia for newborns with disabilities. He may suggest that this is to eliminate human suffering, when in fact it simply eliminates the human.

Dr Jonquiére's response to Catherine Frazee's article opposing euthanasia.

Dementia sufferers may have a 'duty to die'

By Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Baroness Warnock

Baroness Warnock (84), a veteran UK government advisor and one of Britains leading moral philosophers recently stated in a interview with the Church of Scotland's magazine - Life and Work that:

Elderly people suffering from dementia should consider ending their lives because they are a burden on the National Health System (NHS) and their families.

Warnock said:

Pensioners in mental decline are "wasting people's lives" because of the care they require and should be allowed to opt for euthanasia even if they are not in pain.

She insisted that there was "nothing wrong" with people being helped to die for the sake of their loved ones or society.

She hoped people will soon be "licensed to put others down" if they are unable to look after themselves.

The article in the Telegraph stated that:

Recent figures show there are 700,000 people with degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's in Britain. By 2026 experts predict there will be one million dementia sufferers in the country, costing the NHS an estimated 35 billion pounds a year.

The article also stated that:

Last year the Mental Capacity Act came into effect (UK) that gives legal force to "living wills", so patients can appoint an "attorney" to tell doctors when their food and water should be removed.

Warnock also stated that:

"I'm absolutely, fully in agreement that if pain is insufferable, then someone should be given help to die, but I feel there's a wider argument that if somebody absolutely, desperately wants to die because they're a burden to their family, or the state, then I think they should be allowed to die."

"Actually I've just written an article called 'A Duty tod Die?' for a Norwegian periodical. I wrote it really suggesting that there's nothing wrong with feeling you ought to do so for the sake of others as well as yourself."

"If you've an advance directive, appointing someone else to act on your behalf, if you become incapacitated, then I think there is a hope that your advocate may say that you would not wish to live in this condition so please try to help her die."

The article quoted Neil Hunt, the chief executive of the Alzheimer's Society, who said:

"I am shocked and amazed that Baroness Warnock could disregard the value of the lives of people with dementia so callously.

With the right care, a person can have good quality of life very late in to dementia. To suggest that people with dementia shouldn't be entitled to that quality of life or that they should feel that they have some sort of duty to kill themselves is nothing short of barbaric."

The euthanasia lobby has always sold their goals within the framework of suffering, terminally ill people who make a free choice to die. They are a movement that rarely reveal their real goals.

Dr. Philip Nitschke - Australia's Dr. Death, hopes to distribute a "peaceful pill" that would be available to anyone who is tired of living. Nitschke stated several years agon in an interview with the National Review that the "peaceful pill" would be available to troubled teens.

Previous blog entry:
http://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2008/05/alleged-suicide-job-shocks-campaigners.html

Dying With Dignity in the Netherlands (NVVE) has made it very clear in their newsletters that their final goal is the "last will pill" that could be taken by anyone who is tired of living.

At the World Federation of Right to Die conference in September 2006 in Toronto, Dr. Rob Jonquiére, the CEO of the NVVE stated that the actions of the radical side of the right to die movement was holding politicians back from supporting the "last will pill".

The NVVE is also working on establishing euthanasia as a human right.

A previous blog entry
http://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/search/label/Last-will-pill

The next time you are affected by the sales pitch by the euthanasia lobby remember. The end game will be a universal right to die for the competent, a duty to die for the incompetent, and a social pressure on people with disabilities and the elderly to take the "last will/peaceful pill".

The voters in Washington State need to read the comments by Baroness Warnock, Philip Nitscke, the NVVE in the Netherlands and Ludwig Minelli in Switzerland. They need to understand that assisted suicide will not stop with the Initiative 1000 campaign, even Booth Gardner has stated that the I-1000 initiative is only the beginning because voters will not accept more at this time.

Link to the article in the Telegraph:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk:80/news/uknews/2983652/Baroness-Warnock-Dementia-sufferers-may-have-a-duty-to-die.html

Euthanasia still a dilemma for Dutch doctors

I was going through my emails and found this article from May 7, 2008 that was written by Emma Thomasson and published in Reuters.

The article starts by referring to a play that is called "The Good Death" that appears to be very popular in the Netherlands. It is a play about a doctor who injects an old friend, who has cancer, and all the agonising decisions that revolve around the question of euthanasia.

The article then goes on to assess the statistics related to euthanasia in the Netherlands, now that it has been officially legal for 6 years.

The article shows how the number of official euthanasia deaths appears to be dropping while the number of deaths by terminal sedation have skyrocketed. In the Netherlands euthanasia is strickly defined as a voluntary and intentional action. To dehydrate someone to death may be voluntary and intentional but it is an omission.

The article quotes Dr. Rob Jonquire, the leader fo the Right to Die society in the Netherlands who said:
"It is more than a coincidence that euthanasia has gone down and palliative sedation has gone up."

Jonquire then states:
"We hear anecdotal evidence from families that patients actually wanted euthanasia but the doctor instead gave palliative sedation."

The article states that a survey published this year in the Journal of Medical Ethics showed that almost half of the Dutch doctors try to avoid euthanasia because it is against their own values or was difficult to deal with.

Jonquire stated at the World Federation of Right to Die Societies conference in Toronto - September 2006, that the final goal of the Right to Die Society in the Netherlands is the legalization of the "Last-Will-Pill".

The article explains that recent polling shows that 74% of the Dutch people support the concept of the "Last-Will-Pill"

Politically it seems unlikely that such a concept would gain support at the present time especially since certain members of parliament are pushing for better pain relief and less euthanasia.

Dr. Stans Verhagen, a cancer specialist who serves about 800 patients every year said:
"We started with euthanasia in Holland because people were suffering so much pain -- it's what makes us afraid of dying, he said. He likened the end of life to landing a plane."

He then stated:
"We should give less attention to emergency exit and more to how not to crash. It is possible to have a good death."

Bravo Dr. Verhagen.

We should care for people and not kill them.

The story:
http://uk.reuters.com/article/reutersEdge/idUKGRI72656320080507?sp=true

Alleged suicide job shocks campaigners

A New Zealand news agency is suggesting that leaders on both sides of the euthanasia debate are surprised that an American woman using the name Susan Wilson was paid $12,000to fly to New Zealand and assist the death of a woman suffering from depression. http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/1786504

As the long-time leader of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition in Canada and now the International chair, I am neither surprised or shocked by this news.

In September 2006, I attended the World Federation of Right to Die Societies bi-annual conference in Toronto. During the proceedings of that conference, it was apparent that the end-goal for the euthanasia lobby was the acceptance of the "last-will-pill" or the peaceful pill.

Dr. Rob Jonquiere, the moderate leader of the Right to Die movement in the Netherlands explained that by taking the law in their own hands that activists were making it more difficult for politicians to accept the final goal - the acceptance of the "last-will-pill". When you analyze the concept of a last-will-pill you must agree that there is no way to protect people who are depressed or mentally incompetent from killing themselves with this pill.

We already know that the Supreme Court in the Netherlands approved euthanasia for people who are experiencing chronic depression or chronic mental suffering.

Dr. Philip Nitschke, who is the maverick Australian leader of Exit International promoted the peaceful pill that allegedly could be available to anyone at anytime.

Several years ago Wesley Smith reported comments by Nitschke in an article titled "Noxious Nitschke" stating that the "peaceful pill" could be available to troubled teens. http://www.nationalreview.com/smithw/smith200411150826.asp

The question for the euthanasia lobby is not that they oppose euthanasia or assisted suicide for people who suffer depression, the question is how will the public knowledge of their support for these acts affect their campaign to legalize euthanasia or assisted suicide everywhere?

Finally, if there is nothing wrong with assisted suicide then why should assisting a suicide be done for free. Susan Wilson had to fly to New Zealand and accept the chance that she might be arrested for her actions.

Maybe the real shock is that someone would pay her $12,000 and the other members of the euthanasia lobby feel that they are being under paid.