Euthanasia would have deprived young patient of her meaningful last day.

The following letter was published in the Montreal Gazette on July 18, 2013 in response to an article titled: Why palliative care is preferable to euthanasia.

By Nathan Friedland RN

Just a day before she died in my arms, I found, through the death of my patient, what David Benrimoh describes as “the desire to create and hold onto meaning in one’s life.” I had been present for every step of her deterioration and knew that her wish was to fight with everything she had until her last breath.

Somehow, through palliative care, humour, music, food and her incredible family, we were able to give her one last day free of monitors, beeping, blood tests and doctors coming in and out to check on her, not 24 hours before she died. Her room was a party-zone as she listened to music from the 1980s on an old record player her father had brought in from home, and did her best to dance with what was left of her frail body. As I listened in to the Dirty Dancing soundtrack near her door, I could not stop the tears from running down my face. How could such a young girl, at just 17 years of age, be so strong knowing she was going to die? But she was. Her desire was so deep to hold onto her life and what it meant to her that she would simply not go down without a fight. Later that afternoon, she fell asleep, and didn’t wake up again. Many considered her death tragic, though I doubt that she ever did.

All of us struggle to find ourselves and discover who we truly are, and through death, I realized that I indeed discovered the meaning of my life as a nurse dedicated to helping people.

Providing euthanasia could have deprived my patient of her last day, and that, without a doubt, really would have been tragic.

Nathan Friedland RN

Roxboro Quebec

Woman requested assisted suicide because of advanced age.

The following article was written by Ed Madden and published in the Irish Medical Times on July 18, 2013. 

Link to the article.

Ed Madden

Ed Madden, BL, looks at a recent European Court of Human Rights case in which an 82-year-old woman sought the right to be allowed to obtain a lethal dose of sodium pentobarbital to end her own life.

Ms Alda Gross is 82 years old and lives in Switzerland. For many years, she had expressed a wish to end her own life. She was becoming more and more frail as time went by and was unwilling to continue suffering the decline of her physical and mental faculties.

In 2005, following a failed suicide attempt, she received inpatient treatment for six months in a psychiatric hospital. This treatment did not, however, alter her wish to die. As she was afraid of the possible consequences of another failed suicide attempt, she wished to end her life by taking a lethal dose of sodium pentobarbital.

‘Selfish motives’

She contacted the assisted-death association, EXIT, for support. They informed her that it would be difficult to find a medical practitioner who would be ready to provide her with a medical prescription for the lethal drug. This was despite the fact that under the terms of Article 115 of the Swiss Penal Code, assisting another person to commit suicide is not a punishable offence unless it is done for “selfish motives”.

In October 2008 a psychiatrist gave an expert opinion that “there was no doubt” that Ms Gross was capable of forming her own judgment. He noted that her wish to die was reasoned and well-considered, had persisted for several years and was not based on any psychiatric illness. From a psychiatric/medical point of view, he did not have any objection to her being prescribed a lethal dose of sodium pentobarbital. However, he refrained from issuing the necessary prescription on the grounds that he did not want to confuse the roles of medical expert and treating physician.

Ms Gross subsequently made a request for a prescription to three other medical practitioners, all of whom declined to provide her with the means of ending her own life. When the Health Board of the Canton of Zurich declined a similar request, Ms Gross took her case to the Swiss courts.

Private life

She argued that her right to respect for her private life under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights had been breached by the refusal of the medical authorities to provide her with the means of ending her own life. She claimed that her right under the Convention to decide by which means and at what point her life would end was “illusory”. The state was under an obligation to provide her with the necessary means to exercise her right to die in a concrete and effective way. Both the Administrative Court and the Federal Supreme Court rejected her case. Ms Gross appealed to the European Court of Human Rights.

In May 2013, the European Court issued its judgment in the case. The Court said that the notion of “private life” within the meaning of Article 8 of the Convention is a broad concept, which encompasses, inter alia, the right to personal autonomy and personal development.

Without in any way negating the principle of the sanctity of life protected under the Convention, many people are concerned that in an era of growing medical sophistication combined with longer life expectancy, they should not be forced to ‘linger on’ in old age or ‘in states of advanced physical or mental decrepitude’, which conflicted with strongly-held ideas of self and personal identity. Ms Gross’s wish to be provided with a dose of sodium pentobarbital allowing her to end her life fell within the scope of her right to respect for her private life under Article 8 of the Convention.

Under the case law of the Swiss Federal Supreme Court, a doctor was entitled to prescribe sodium pentobarbital in order to allow his patient to commit suicide, provided that specific conditions were fulfilled. In this regard, The Swiss courts had referred to the medical ethics guidelines on the care of patients at end-of-life issued by the Swiss Academy of Medical Sciences (SAMS). These guidelines did not have the formal quality of law. In any event, as Ms Gross was not suffering from a terminal illness, her case did not fall within the scope of those guidelines.

A chilling effect

The Court observed that there was no other material containing principles or standards which could serve as guidelines as to whether and in what circumstances a doctor was entitled to issue a prescription for sodium pentobarbital to a patient who, like Ms Gross, was not suffering from a terminal illness. The lack of clear legal guidelines was likely to have “a chilling effect” on doctors who would otherwise be inclined to provide someone such as Ms Gross with the requested medical prescription.

The Court said that Ms Gross “must have found herself in a state of anguish and uncertainty” regarding the extent of her right to end her life. This would not have occurred had there been clear, state-approved guidelines. The Court acknowledged that there might be difficulties in finding the necessary political consensus on a controversial question such as this with a profound ethical and moral impact. However, those difficulties were inherent in any democratic process and could not absolve the government from fulfilling its obligations.

The Court concluded that Swiss law, while providing the possibility of obtaining a lethal dose of sodium pentobarbital on medical prescription, did not provide sufficient guidelines ensuring clarity as to the extent of that right. There had accordingly been a violation of Article 8 of the Convention in that respect. The Court did not, however, adopt a stance on what should be contained in such guidelines. That was a matter for the Swiss authorities.

Three of the seven judges issued a joint dissenting judgment.

References: [2013] ECHR 429; [2013] ECHR 580

The spread of physician-assisted suicide.

Jacqueline Harvey

By Jacqueline Harvey, Public Discourse - July 18, 2013.

Link to the article.

On May 20, Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin signed “The Patient Choice and Control at the End of Life Act,” legalizing physician-assisted suicide (PAS) throughout the state. This event matters not only because this law governs life and death, but also because Vermont is the first state to sanction PAS through the legislative process, via the votes of elected representatives. The law also represents the spread of PAS from the West Coast to the opposite side of the United States.

While neither of these characteristics may alarm right-to-life and disability rights advocates (who perhaps are concerned solely for the people of Vermont), policy scholars know that both of these attributes greatly enhance PAS proponents’ ability to spread the scourge of voluntary euthanasia throughout New England and eventually nationwide.

Prior to Vermont’s action, over 120 PAS bills had been filed in the states, but overwhelming expert testimony against PAS always succeeded in persuading legislators across party lines of its danger to citizens and society. This is what led voluntary euthanasia lobbyists to abandon legislative efforts (which demand information that is damning to their agenda) and instead place their hope in the ignorance of the average voter, who unlike a lawmaker wouldn’t have the benefit of scientific facts and could therefore be swayed by emotional appeals and clever semantics. Polls show that a support for PAS varies by 20 percent based on how the question is phrased, although the outcome remains the same.

Don't give doctors euthanasia powers.

Yesterday, the National Post published an edited version of my letter that they titled: Don't give doctors euthanasia powers. 

My letter responded to the article: That terrifies us: Canadian doctors get virtually no training on handling a patients desire to die.

Alex Schadenberg

Don't give doctors euthanasia powers.

By Alex Schadenberg

Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

This article notes that "Most doctors finish their degrees ... with virtually no instruction on how to deal with death generally, let alone patients who ask for help with suicide." 

I believe that between the lines, this article is suggesting that if euthanasia were legal, end-of-life care would improve. Instead, legalizing euthanasia in Canada would give physicians the right, in law, to cause the death of their patients by lethal injection.

The article focuses on a few bad cases while suggesting that good end-of-life care can lead to a good death. 

When euthanasia becomes part of a medical system it leads to new ethical problems and unlike most medical errors, the abuse of euthanasia causes death.

In Belgium, where euthanasia is legal, independent studies have found that 32% of assisted deaths are done without request. These deaths are hidden from the statistics since another study found that 47% of the assisted deaths were not reported.

Considering all the difficulties that we are experiencing within Canada's medical system, do we really want our doctors to gain the right, in law, to cause our death?

The inconsistent philosophy of an assisted suicide campaigner.

By Alex Schadenberg

Alex Schadenberg on right.

For many years, Margaret Battin has been a well known leader of the assisted suicide lobby in America. Over the past few years she has become known for the care of her husband, Brooke Hopkins, who experienced a bicycle accident, in which he broke his neck and has been living with quadriplegia since November 14, 2008.

Hopkins had recently retired as an English professor at the University of Utah, when the accident occurred. His accident has challenged some of Battin’s long-held beliefs related to euthanasia and assisted suicide.

The following article is a synopsis of an article that was written by Robin Marantz Henig and published in the New York Times on July 17, 2013, under the title: A Life or Death Situation. The New York Times article appears balanced in its approach.

Euthanasia is an action or omission of an action that directly and intentionally causes the death of a person, for reasons of mercy. The death is directly and intentionally caused.

Assisted suicide is the direct and intentional involvement in a suicide by providing the means of death, or by counseling or encouraging a person to commit suicide.

Euthanasia

Withdrawing medical treatment, if the person dies, is a natural death and is not a form of euthanasia or assisted suicide. The definition of medical treatment has been expanded to include hydration and nutrition. Hydration and nutrition should not be defined as medical treatment but rather medical care.

There were times that Hopkins could have died by asking that medical treatment be withdrawn. Americans have the right to have medical treatment withheld or withdrawn.

Hopkins has continued to live by not withdrawing medical treatment, but like every human being, he has gone through periods of emotional strength and also periods of depression connected to feelings of hopelessness.

The article states that a year before the accident Hopkins had updated his “living will” to state that should he suffer a grievous illness or injury leading to a terminal condition or vegetative state, he wanted no procedures done that:

“would only serve to prolong the moment of my death and to unnaturally postpone or prolong the dying process.”

The article provides insight by stating:

“If Peggy (Margaret) had been there and known the extent of Brooke’s injury, she might have urged the rescuers not to revive him. … But Peggy wasn’t there, and Brooke … was kept breathing with a hand-pumped air bag during the ambulance ride to University Hospital, three miles away. As soon as he got there, he was attached to a ventilator.”

The article then states:

“By the time Peggy arrived and saw her husband ensnared in the life-sustaining machinery he hoped to avoid, decisions about intervention already had been made.”

This is a very important point considering the fact that Hopkins has lived nearly 5 years since his accident and he continues to live today.

The theme of the article is: Suffering, suicide, euthanasia, a dignified death – these were subjects she had thought and written about for years, and now, suddenly, they turned unbearably personal. … she would watch lofty ideas be trumped by reality – and would discover just how messy, raw and muddled the end of life can be.

Brooke Hopkins, Margaret Battin

The article points out that, after the accident, Battin wondered: “What if my whole life has been wrong?” Her whole life had involved writing “wheelbarrows full” of books and articles championing self-determination in dying.

Battin has been a long-time defender of euthanasia and all of the groups that promote euthanasia. The article states:

“Nor did she run from fringe groups like NuTech, … or Soars (Society for Old Age Rational Suicide). … She also found common purpose with … Compassion and Choices, that push for legislation or ballot initiatives” 

“At the heart of her argument was her belief in autonomy.”

Even though Battin has been a euthanasia activist the article states that she was now faced with a dilemma:

“It (euthanasia) is not about terminally ill people in general in a kind of abstract way now, its also about my husband, Brooke. I still love him, that’s a simple fact. What if he wanted to die? Can I imagine standing by while his ventilator was switched off?”

This is a key issue in the New York Times article. Battin appears to be constantly examining Hopkins medical treatment issues within the framework of whether or not this or that decision represents what a euthanasia lobby leader should do. She appears conflicted. This conflict creates a lasting difficulty for her and for Hopkins.

One of the issues is the cost of caring for a person with complications related to quadriplegia. The article explains that Battin and Hopkins created a 24-hour care-team. Hopkins medical needs and the care-team are partly paid for by the University of Utah’s health insurance, partly paid by Medicare and yet they pay about $250,000 per year, mainly for the cost of the 12 care-givers.

Depression and treatment issues

The New York Times article candidly covers the issue of depression.

Hopkins admits that he has experienced significant bouts with depression. He stated that he recognized the feeling, having struggled with bipolar disorder since adolescence.

Hopkins explained how he has good days and bad days. The article describes how he enjoys his friends playing music or reading with him, reading and writing, walking in the park, being with his step-children.

But on his bad days: “these pleasures fade, and everything about his current life seems bleak.”

The article then quotes Battin:

“Depression is not uncommon in winter. It’s important to think positive thoughts.”

Brooke Hopkins

Hopkins responds:

“Basically I dislike being dependent, that’s all,” 

“One thing I don’t like is people speaking for me, though.”

Battin responded:

“And that includes me?”

Hopkins states:

“Yes, I don’t like that.”

It is important that Hopkins has been teaching part time for the University of Utah’s adult-education program. Many people with disabilities are unable to find employment and become dependent on others.

The article reported an interesting interaction with Battin while Hopkins was teaching his class. Battin was concerned about how he looked and how he was reacting to his students.

Battin stated:

“He’s never looked this bad.” She asked him: “Are you O.K.?”

Hopkins responded:

“I’m fine, don’t worry”

Battin continued being concerned about the mucus in his lungs and inquired about his CoughAssist therapy. Hopkins said he didn’t want it while the class was there. Battin urged him to try albuterol instead, Hopkins said no, Battin insisted, so finally Hopkins gave in. Class resumed.

You will notice how Battin's constant fear about her husbands health leads her to skew her theory on how people are pressured by family and friends.

His “Final Letter”

On July 28, 2012 Hopkins decided that he couldn’t go on living. Battin proofread and typed the "Final Letter." Battin decided that his decision was: carefully considered, serious and sincere, autonomous, that her husband was fully alert, the very situation that she had spent her career defending.

“She reasoned that Brooke had the right, as a mentally competent patient, to reject medical interventions that could further prolong his life.”

It must be noted that withholding or withdrawing medical treatment is not the same as euthanasia or assisted suicide.

From that point, the articles states that, Battin shifted from being Brooke’s devoted lifeline to being the midwife to his death.

And yet in August 2012, when Hopkins became uncomfortable and delirious from breathing problems, caused from pneumonia, Battin brought him to the emergency room.

On August 18, 2012 Hopkins stated that he wanted to ‘soldier on’ despite difficulties.

Hydration and Nutrition

The ‘living will’ that Hopkins had signed the year before his accident also stated that he wished to avoid:

 “administration of sustenance and hydration.”

In August 2012, Hopkins had a bout of pneumonia that hospitalized him for several weeks. In order to avoid infections Hopkins agreed to have a feeding tube inserted.

Feeding tubes are an effective way to provide fluids and food. Fluids and food by feeding tube should not be defined as a medical treatment because they do not treat a condition but rather provide for the basic necessaries of life.

The article stated:

“In his prior life, Hopkins couldn’t have imagined tolerating a feeding tube; he loved eating too much.” 

“Thus a man who had always taken great joy in preparing, sharing and savoring food decided to give up his final sensory pleasure in order to go on living. He swears he doesn’t miss it.”

Hopkins stated:

 “You can get used to anything.”

A Desire to die.

It appears clear from the article that Hopkins desire to die fluctuates.

Hopkins states that if he was given the choice of going to the hospital or dying, that he would choose dying. But at the same time he states that when he was brought to the hospital that Battin made the “right call.”

Hopkins clarifies his statement by saying: 

‘What I mean is I’m done doing this stuff in the hospital. But I’m not ready to die yet.’

Battin is trying to learn how a transient despair differs from a deep and abiding decision to die. 

The article states:

“What has changed,” she told me, “is my sense of how extremely complex, how extremely textured, any particular case is.” This realization is infinitely more fraught when you’re inextricably invested in the outcome and when the signals your loved one sends are not only hard to read but also are constantly in flux. 

“Proponents (euthanasia movement) generally focus on only one branch of the decision tree: the moment of choosing death. There’s much talk of living wills, D.N.R. orders, suicide, withdrawal of life support, exit strategies. Brooke’s experience has forced Peggy to step back from that moment to an earlier one: the moment of confronting one’s own horrific circumstances and choosing, at least for now, to keep on living.

Battin then admits that her own desires also shift from day to day. The article states:

She is deeply afraid of misunderstanding Brooke’s wishes in a way that can’t be undone. The worst outcome, to her, would be to think that this time he really does want to die and then to feel as if she might have been wrong.

This statement by Battin provides insight into the mindset of a committed euthanasia proponent. She fears making a wrong decision that allows Hopkins to live. The greater fear should be that she makes a wrong decision that causes Hopkins to die.

Psychiatrist, Harvey Chochinov, has done significant research into the issue of the "Will to Live" and has designed a program titled: Dignity Therapy. Chochinov proves that it is normal for the will to live to fluctuate.

While Hopkins is living a plethora of choices remain available. When he is dead, no further choices remain.

Rejecting those who oppose assisted suicide.

The article examines the question of euthanasia and assisted suicide. The article states: 

opponents who say that helping the terminally ill to die will lead eventually to pressure being put on vulnerable people — the elderly, the poor, the chronically disabled, the mentally ill — to agree to die to ease the burden on the rest of us.

Battin rejects those who oppose euthanasia. The article states:

The scholarly work she is most proud of is a study she conducted in 2007, which is one of the first to look empirically at whether people are being coerced into choosing to end their lives. Peggy was reassured when she and her colleagues found that in Oregon and the Netherlands, two places that allow assisted dying, the people who used it tended to be better off and more educated than the people in groups considered vulnerable.

The study Battin conducted in 2007 relied on the “official data” from the Netherlands and Oregon which is not sufficient to prove her hypothesis. The data from the Netherlands and Oregon is incomplete at best because it is based on reports that are submitted by the doctors who caused the death. Inconsistencies with the law are not reported because people do not self-report that they broke the law.

Further to that, just because people who die by euthanasia or assisted suicide tend to be wealthier or better educated doesn’t preclude them from experiencing abuse. People who experience elder abuse are more likely to be wealthier than average.

Link to my previous article on Margaret Battin's 2007 study.

The article then states:

What Peggy has become more aware of now is the possibility of the opposite, more subtle, kind of coercion — not the influence of a greedy relative or a cost-conscious state that wants you to die, but pressure from a much-loved spouse or partner who wants you to live. The very presence of these loved ones undercuts the notion of true autonomy. We are social beings, and only the unluckiest of us live in a vacuum; for most, there are always at least a few people who count on us, adore us and have a stake in what we decide. Everyone’s autonomy abuts someone else’s.

Battin should realize that her comments go both ways. I am not convinced that the “greedy relative” is a common phenomenon, but I know from the many phone calls that I have received that subtle pressure is being placed on people while they are in a vulnerable condition.

Battin states that: 

“The very presence of these loved ones undercuts the notion of true autonomy” and that “Everyone’s autonomy abuts someone else’s.” 

These are true statements, but these statements support the need to prohibit euthanasia and assisted suicide. True autonomy, as presented by the euthanasia lobby is an illusion. Everyone is effected by others.

Battin is then quoted as stating that she is:

“committed to two moral constructs in end-of-life decision making: autonomy and mercy. 

“Only where both are operating — that is, where the patient wants to die and dying is the only acceptable way for the patient to avoid pain and suffering — is there a basis for physician-assisted dying, … Neither principle is sufficient in and of itself and, in tandem, the two principles operate as safeguards against abuse.”

It is interesting that Battin has moved from a position of autonomy alone to one of autonomy and mercy.

Battin should recognize that “mercy” is a two-edged sword. Mercy can be oriented to the relief of suffering or it can be oriented to the elimination of the sufferer. Mercy can be based on a genuine concern for the "other" while it can also be based on a concern for the "self." We cannot rely on an ethic of mercy, that is easily distorted, in order to determine who lives or who dies.

One day Hopkins announced that he wanted all of his machines disconnected. After a short skirmish, all of his machines were disconnected.

Hopkins put his head back, closed his eyes and waited to die. After several minutes passed he opened his eyes and said: 

“I didn’t die?”

He then had everything re-attached. He felt refreshed, as if he had made it through some sort of trial and three hours later his students arrived and he began teaching.

By withdrawing all medical treatment, Hopkins thought that he would die, but without knowing it, he wasn’t ventilator dependent. He breathed on his own. He lived.

If euthanasia or assisted suicide were legal in Utah, he might have been given a lethal injection. Whether he was ventilator dependent or not, he would have been dead.

Clearly there is a difference between killing and letting die. To withhold or withdraw medical treatment is not the same as euthanasia or assisted suicide.

The story ends by informing us that Hopkins has written another “farewell letter” stating that he intends to die in the Spring of 2014. I hope that instead, he decides to ‘soldier on’ despite his difficulties.

Brooke Hopkins died on July 31, 2013.

P.S. Margaret Battin's 2007 study and then the subsequent Royal Society of Canada study and the Falconer Commission report led me to write the book: Exposing Vulnerable People to Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide. The euthanasia lobby relies on limited data to establish the false conclusion that legalizing euthanasia is safe.

Link to a previous articles:
- Expert in Irish assisted suicide court case claims that no abuse of vulnerable people occurs.
- Euthanasia campaigner shows signs of wavering on the issue.
- Margaret Battin research article was false when published in 2007 and it is false today.

New Zealand Labour Party should ditch assisted suicide bill.

Media Release

Family First New Zealand - July 17, 2013

Labour Should Ditch Assisted Suicide Bill Now.

Family First NZ says that Labour MP Maryann Street should immediately withdraw her private members bill which is attempting to decriminalise assisted suicide or euthanasia.

“To legalise assisted suicide would place large numbers of vulnerable people at risk – in particular those who are depressed, elderly, sick, disabled, those experiencing chronic illness, limited access to good medical care, and those who feel themselves to be under emotional or financial pressure to request early death,” says Bob McCoskrie, National Director of Family First NZ. “It would also send a dangerous message to young people about suicide and the value of life.”

“Maintaining the current laws protects all New Zealanders equally.”

“Labour’s key priority should be to improve provision of good palliative care and practical support. All New Zealanders should have access to quality pain control — no matter where they live. Pain control and palliative medicine should be given a higher priority in medical training so that every New Zealander can benefit.”

“We also need to apply the precautionary principle: the higher the risk – the higher the burden of proof on those proposing legislation. The risk of abuse cannot be eliminated, as has been evidenced in overseas jurisdictions such as the Netherlands and Belgium,” says Mr McCoskrie.

“Legalising assisted suicide is a recipe for abuse. So-called ‘safeguards’ are an illusion because they are unable to prevent the potential for coercion and abuse.”

“Older New Zealanders are not a problem to be rid of — they’re a generation to be honoured and cared for. Elder Abuse has become a significant problem in New Zealand. We cannot ignore the possibility that dependent elderly people may be coerced into euthanasia or assisted suicide,” says Mr McCoskrie.

“We cannot put older New Zealanders at risk by creating new paths to elder abuse, potentially resulting in a ‘duty to die’.”

Previous article: Euthanasia lobby in New Zealand will decide if euthanasia bill is delayed.

Euthanasia Holocaust was about Eugenics

The following article was written by Wesley Smith and published on his blog on July 16 under the title: Euthanasia Holocaust, Not About Nazi's.

Wesley Smith

By: Wesley Smith - July 16, 2013

Germany is creating a memorial to the 200,000 + victims of the euthanasia Holocaust, in which doctors enthusiastically killed disabled babies and adults between the years 1939-45. From the BBC story:

Work has begun on a memorial in Germany for the 300,000 people murdered by the Nazis for having mental and physical disabilities or chronic illnesses. A 30m (100ft) long glass wall is being built in the centre of Berlin, near the former site of the Nazi-era office that organised the “euthanasia” programme. “>In 1939, Adolf Hitler told officials that people “considered incurable” should be “granted a mercy killing”.

Euthanasia Memorial

It is a misnomer to say that these helpless people were “Nazi” victims. The doctors who killed disabled people were not necessarily Nazis and certainly weren’t forced by the government into murder. Rather, they were eugenics enthusiasts who truly believed that killing was a “healing treatment” that was best for the patient, family, and Reich.

If that sounds familiar, it should. Today, the Netherlands permits the infanticide of babies because they are seriously disabled as an act of “compassion,” and “after-birth abortion” is promoted in the most respectable medical and bioethics journals. Eugenic abortion is an epidemic, with 90% of Down and dwarf fetuses never being permitted to see the light of day. We dehydrate to death people with profound cognitive disabilities by removing sustenance from them.

Suicide clinics are operating in Switzerland and in Belgium euthanasia is coupled with organ harvesting. Assisted suicide/euthanasia has been redefined into “aid in dying” or “death with dignity.” This would all be familiar territory for the eugenicists of the early to middle 20th century.

Calling the euthanasia Holocaust a “Nazi” issue is a defense mechanism that enables us to pursue pernicious policies–with some different motives and without the hate speech, to be sure–and not see that a log is also in our own eye. For as Dr. Leo Alexander–the noted psychiatrist and medical investigator at the Nuremberg Trials–warned in the 1949 pages of the New England Journal of Medicine:

Whatever proportions these crimes finally assumed, it became evident to all who investigated them that they had started from small beginnings. The beginnings at first were merely a subtle shift in emphasis in the basic attitude of the physicians. It started with the acceptance of the attitude, basic in the euthanasia movement, that there is such a thing as life not worthy to be lived. This attitude in its early stages concerned itself merely with the severely and chronically sick. Gradually the sphere of those to be included in this category was enlarged to encompass the socially unproductive, the ideologically unwanted, the racially unwanted and finally all non-Germans. But it is important to realize that the infinitely small wedged-in lever from which this entire trend of mind received its impetus was the attitude toward the nonrehabilitable sick… 

The killing center is the reductio ad absurdum of all health planning based only on rational principles and economy and not on humane compassion and divine law. To be sure, American physicians are still far from the point of thinking of killing centers, but they have arrived at a danger point in thinking, at which likelihood of full rehabilitation is considered a factor that should determine the amount of time, effort and cost to be devoted to a particular type of patient on the part of the social body upon which this decision rests. At this point Americans should remember that the enormity of a euthanasia movement is present in their own midst.

And here’s an irony: The NEJM actively supports many of the policies against which Alexander warned. The utilitarian and eugenic “quality of life” attitudes that intellectually enabled the medical Holocaust–and indeed, which were advocated within the medical intellegentsia long before the Nazis were a dark cloud on the horizon–are more than present in our own midst. They are in danger of prevailing–and without the backing of a despotism. 

New Zealand Euthanasia lobby will decide if euthanasia bill is delayed until after the election.

The New Zealand Herald newspaper reported in an article titled: Euthanasia bill under party pressure, that Labour MP Maryan Street is under pressure to drop her member's bill which would legalise euthanasia because her party is concerned it could be a negative distraction in the lead-up to the general election next year. 

The New Zealand Labour party is reported to be concerned that the euthanasia issue will become an electoral distraction in the 2014 election. Street may not agree with her party. She stated:

"that it would be a distraction for all parties, and the debate would affect not just Labour."

Ms. Street & Alex Schadenberg

Street indicated that she would first consult the pro-euthanasia group: End of Life Choice, which had asked her to draft the bill. The article stated:

A spokeswoman for the group, Yvonne Shaw, said the organisation had been lobbying for a change for 30 years and public support was now overwhelming for a law change. 

Another lobby group, Exit International, said that if the bill were withdrawn it would be a setback for legal, voluntary euthanasia in this country.

Members bills in New Zealand are drawn out, rather than being brought forward in "order of precedence." Therefore Street's bill may or may not be drawn out before the next election. The article stated:

At present, there are 69 members' bills in the ballot. Nine members' bills were still waiting for a first reading, so another ballot was unlikely to be held until the end of the year. 

The last attempt to legalise euthanasia, the Death with Dignity Bill, was narrowly voted down by 60 votes to 58 votes in 2003.

Euthanasia Debate

The euthanasia lobby in New Zealand have control over Ms. Street's political decision making. I wonder what they have done to make her more loyal to them than her party?

I debated Ms Street last year on national television in New Zealand. 

Street promoted euthanasia without the understanding that legalizing euthanasia will have consequences.

Link to my article: Speaking tour of Australia and New Zealand - Part 3, 

Link to the televised New Zealand debate. Q + A TV program.

More articles on the New Zealand euthanasia bill.

- Dangers of euthanasia spelt out.

- Debates on euthanasia. The soul of medicine is on trial.

- Down Syndrome community opposes New Zealand euthanasia bill.

Redefining Dementia in Denmark

This article is about the documentary that was produced by Karin Wells for CBC radio in Canada. 

Link to the CBC radio program.

This program was originally aired on November 14, 2012 entitled: Redefining Dementia in Denmark.

----------

Denmark looks after its old people. 

Lotte, the most famous nursing home in the country, has become an international shrine for anyone seeking another way ... a happier way ... to make a life for people with dementia.

Lotte is a big old brick house on the west side of Copenhagen, where 23 men and women live like a family. Seventy per cent of the family has dementia.

Thyra Frank

They take Caribbean vacations together. The 98-year-old man on the second floor has fallen in love with the 101-year-old woman. The cat sits curled up next to the dining room table.

Lotte's first leader, Thyra Frank, is the rock star of elder care in Denmark.

Denmark - like every other country in Europe - is in an economic squeeze. Yet Lotte is fully funded and fostered by the Danish government.

The underlying philosophy of elder care is well rooted.  Every man or woman, no matter how ill, or how old, has the right to choose how they want to live.

We all know the numbers - dementia of some sort is catching up with more and more of us. It is a frightening prospect.

No one wants to see mum or dad  - or to imagine themselves - strapped down to a bed in a locked dementia ward - chemically warehoused. But in North America, the choices are limited.

Which is why the world looks to Denmark -- where it is illegal to imprison people with dementia in locked wards; where nursing homes regularly take their people on holiday, and where people with dementia are asked what they want to do today.

Karin Wells's called the documentary: It's Their Life.