Texas: Murder of Disabled Spouse Yields Probation for Wife

This is a reprint of the blog entry by Stephen Drake from Not Dead Yet. This is a very important blog entry.

Texas has a reputation for doling out pretty harsh treatment when it comes to murder. Apparently - in Austin, anyway - exceptions will be made if the victim is devalued enough.

Last Friday, Katherine "Kim" Yarbrough received ten years of probation in a plea bargain. Yarbrough had admitted to killing her husband, Lloyd Yarbrough. Nevertheless, she was allowed to plead to "injury to a disabled individual."

From the article in the Austin-American Statesman:

Police say Yarbrough admitted killing her husband, Lloyd, 62, by injecting his feeding tube with an assortment of crushed prescription pills. She then swallowed some drugs of her own, police have said. A police officer found the couple in bed May 27 at their home on Meadowview Lane, near Lamar and Research boulevards in North Austin.

Here is what the authorities have to say about the plea deal:

Outside court Friday, prosecutor Amy Meredith said that considering the facts of the case and Yarbrough's clean criminal history, District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg did not think that a prison term was warranted.

Meredith noted that for years when selecting jurors in murder cases, prosecutors had used an example similar to Yarbrough's — when one spouse kills another to end that spouse's suffering — as a type of murder case that might warrant a probation sentence. (emphasis added.)

The problem with that rationale - and its reported in the article, but not as a problem, is that Kim Yarbrough never claimed to have killed her husband to end his suffering:

She blogged about her frustrations with outside caregivers and a lack of a support system.

"I wonder if I will ever change Lloyd's diaper without feeling the pain of what has been lost," she blogged four days before his death.

Two days before his death, she wrote, "Why should I keep living through all this?"

While in the hospital, Yarbrough was interviewed by police. According to an arrest affidavit, she told an officer that she killed her husband "because she was tired of taking care of him." When an officer asked her if Lloyd Yarbrough wanted to die, she said "no," the affidavit said. (emphasis added.)

There is no way to reconcile Kim Yarbrough's statements to the police with the statements of the prosecutor attempting to explain this plea bargain. I guess they figure in Austin that if you're a "caregiver" you also get to end that role, in whatever way you see fit. I guess they figure that killing someone as disabled as Lloyd Yarbrough isn't the same as a "real" murder.

If you think I'm being too harsh, several of the comments to this story have people praising this woman - evidently they don't know how to read or they don't think what Lloyd Yarbrough wanted mattered. --Stephen Drake

Ontario closes its eyes to elder abuse

An article in the Toronto Star the other day really outlined the lack of concern for the problem of Elder Abuse in Ontario.

The article by Carol Goar on April 26, 2010 concerning the defeat of the elder abuse bill by John O'Toole stated:

Conservative backbencher John O'Toole was puzzled when four Liberal cabinet ministers showed up to vote on his private member's bill.

The provincial government didn't normally devote such high-level attention to opposition proposals. And this one wasn't even controversial. A previous version of the same bill had sailed through second reading (approval in principle) two years ago, but died on the order paper when Premier Dalton McGuinty prorogued the session.

All O'Toole was asking the government to do was instruct the Office of the Public Guardian and Trustee (the agency responsible for adults who are mentally incapable of managing their affairs) to set up a public registry of individuals with power of attorney for those who have relinquished control of their finances.

Such a database would allow concerned relatives, friends, bankers, accountants and nursing home officials to find out who is in charge of an elderly person's property. It would also facilitate police investigations into complaints by vulnerable seniors and their caregivers.

“It's a non-partisan issue,” O'Toole insisted. As proof, he pointed out that his bill was at odds with his own non-interventionist ideology. “As a Conservative, I want less government, but this is an area where we need more government.”

His hopes withered when Liberal MPP David Zimmer, parliamentary secretary to the attorney general, spoke. The Willowdale politician said he could not support the bill because it violated the wishes of many aging parents. At the behest of their doctor or a financial adviser, they had designated one of their children or a friend or lawyer to act on their behalf, should they become incapacitated. But they wanted this information to be kept private. Their desire should be respected, Zimmer argued.

A few minutes later, Khalil Ramal, a Liberal backbencher from London, chimed in. “I think this bill does not serve seniors well. I'm not going to vote for this bill, not because I don't like the member for Durham — he's a great member — but hey, it doesn't fit with the direction of the legalities.”

After this bewildering statement, O'Toole was invited by the Speaker to respond. Recognizing the futility of a last-ditch appeal, he acknowledged the inevitable. “This is not going to become law. I fully understand this.”

His bill was soundly defeated. Six MPPs (four Tories and two New Democrats) said yes. Twenty three MPPs (all Liberals) said no.

“I was surprised they wouldn't even let it go to a committee,” O'Toole said afterward. “That's what that I was really hoping for.”

He hasn't given up. But he has no idea how to get elder abuse back on the legislative agenda.

What troubles O'Toole most is the lack of awareness of the extent and seriousness of this problem. He was as ignorant as everyone else, he admitted, until a constituent opened his eyes. It simply wasn't a topic of conversation in business or social circles. Looking back on his 30-year management career at General Motors, he couldn't remember anyone ever mentioning it. Nor did it come up during his four years as a municipal councillor or his nine years as a school board trustee.

He's still no expert, O'Toole stresses. But he's dealt with enough cases of frail seniors losing their homes, savings, investments and possessions to know the problem is real and more prevalent than people think. He's also learned a great deal from the Durham police, who have two officers working full-time on elder abuse, and from the strong coalition of volunteers, social service providers and health professionals working to protect vulnerable seniors in his riding.

For their sake, he wishes his bill had passed. For Ontario's sake, he hopes the government wakes up.

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/article/800155--ontario-closes-its-eyes-to-elder-abuse

WE WON - Bill C-384 was defeated, 228 to 59

Bill C-384, the private members bill that would have legalized euthanasia and assisted suicide in Canada was strongly defeated by a vote of 228 to 59.

We would like to thank every member of parliament who voted against Bill C-384. We would also like to thank all of our supporters who made this victory possible. Months of work have resulted in an incredible victory. But the battle is not over.

We are working to turn the debate on this issue to a debate on how Canadians can live with dignity.

We recognize that many people have raised legitimate concerns.

It is our goal to work with members of parliament and other Canadian leaders to identify ways to:

- improve palliative/hospice care throughout Canada, 

- change attitudes and improve services for people with disabilities, 

- institute an effective national suicide prevention strategy, 

- promote programs that identify and eliminate the scourge of elder abuse.

We must continue to build a nation that upholds the dignity of all its citizens.
We must continue to create a paradigm that protects all Canadians, including its most vulnerable.
We reject the concept that killing can be the answer to problems that are properly solved by a caring society.

Alex Schadenberg
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
www.euthanasiaprevention.on.ca
euthanasiaprevention@on.aibn.com
1-877-439-3348

Please enable the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition to continue its successful work by making a donation today.

Our investment of resources to defeat Bill C-384 has left us with a huge financial need. http://www.euthanasiaprevention.on.ca/Donations.htm

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition Responds to Francine Lalonde’s National Post Article

Today, Francine Lalonde published an article in the National Post promoting her private members bill, Bill C-384, which would legalise euthanasia and assisted suicide for those 18 years and older.

Lalonde’s article omits the topic of elder abuse and misrepresents the bill’s provisions.

In Canada, elder abuse is a widespread problem, which is often unreported. Older persons with money are a prime target with family members the usual perpetrators. See e.g. Canada’s official website at: http://www.seniors.gc.ca/c.4nt.2nt3col@.jsp?lang=eng&geo=110&lang=eng&geo=169&cid=161

Perpetrators can also be strangers, for example, Melissa Friedrich, Canada's “Internet Black Widow.”

Contrary to Lalonde’s article, C-384 lacks basic protections for patients. For example, the patient is not required to be lucid at the time of application. A patient must only “appear” to be lucid. C-384 also allows an heir, who will benefit from the death, to serve as power of attorney to approve the euthanasia or assisted suicide. The death is also not required to be witnessed by disinterested persons. Without witnesses, the opportunity is created for someone else to administer the lethal agent to the patient without the patient’s consent. Even if the patient struggled, who would know?

C-384 is a recipe for elder abuse. For more detailed information, see memo to parliament: http://www.euthanasiaprevention.on.ca/1016_001.pdf

Alex Schadenberg
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
1-877-439-3348
euthanasiaprevention@on.aibn.com
www.euthanasiaprevention.on.ca

Margaret Dore, Lawyer
www.margaretdore.com

Life with Dignity is the right of every Canadian.

Every Canadian deserves excellent end-of-life care.

Every Canadian deserves to be treated with equality, especially people with disabilities and those who live with chronic physical or mental pain.

Every Canadian deserves to be protected from undue influence and be provided respect.

Bill C-384 is not limited to terminally illness, it allows euthanasia and assisted suicide for people who experience chronic physical or mental pain.

Bill C-384 defines competency as “appearing to be lucid.” In other words you do not have to be actually lucid, and

Bill C-384 is a recipe for elder abuse, it does not require a witness at the time of death and employs a relaxed standard of competency, “appearing to be lucid”. Considering the prevalence of elder abuse in Canada today, every MP should oppose this bill.

Every Canadian deserves excellent care, not to be killed.

Members of Parliament need to soundly defeat Bill C-384

Alex Schadenberg
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
Box 25033, London ON N6C 6A8
1-877-439-3348
euthanasiaprevention@on.aibn.com

Physician-assisted suicide is not “legal” in Montana; doctors and others participate at their peril.

From the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and Montana State Senator Greg Hinkle:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Euthanasia Prevention Coalition & Montana State Senator Greg Hinkle: Physician-assisted suicide is not “legal” in Montana; doctors and others participate at their peril.

MONTANA. Today, the Missoulian reported that the suicide/ euthanasia promotion group, Compassion & Choices, has claimed that more than one Montanan has used physician-assisted suicide since a Montana Supreme Court ruling was issued on December 31, 2010. http://www.missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/article_f857084e-4402-11df-8d38-001cc4c002e0.html.

The ruling in Baxter v. State, did not, however, “legalize” physician-assisted suicide in Montana. Baxter instead held that a physician accused of homicide for killing his or her patient would be allowed to assert a “consent of the victim defense.” Read analysis here: http://www.montanafamily.org/portfolio/pdfs/Baxter_Decision_Analysis_v2.pdf

Tellingly, the Missoulian article does not give the names of the doctors or other persons allegedly involved, who if they were involved, face potential criminal and civil liability or professional discipline.

Public policy reasons against physician-assisted suicide include its potential for abuse, for example, by an heir with designs on an older person’s assets.

April 9, 2010.
Alex Schadenberg
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
1-877-439-3348

Senator Greg Hinkle
Montana state Senate
406-827-4645

Netherlands study promotes greater access to euthanasia

A study from the Netherlands Institute for Health Services Research (NIVEL) that was published in the British Journal of General Practice states that:

"The number of requests for euthanasia in the Netherlands has not risen since an act to decriminalise it came into force in 2002."

It is possible that the requests for euthanasia in the Netherlands have not increased but deaths by euthanasia have certainly increased and deaths by sedation and dehydration have sky-rocketed since 2002.

The Nivel study then recommended that euthanasia should be included in a general practitioner's training.

Since most general practitioner's do not euthanize their patients, is the study promoting a euthanasia training module in order to weed out physicians who are not willing to kill their patients?

The Nivel study also suggested that:

"Nursing homes and hospitals should publish policies on euthanasia so patients are able to take it into consideration when choosing their care provider. The researchers say that one benefit of the 2002 act is that it removes any need for secrecy regarding euthanasia."

It appears that Nivel is attempting to increase the availability of euthanasia by promoting nursing homes and physicians who are willing to kill their patients.

Nivel researcher Gé Donker, who is also a physician, was quoted as saying:

"It's (euthanasia) not something any general practitioner enjoys doing. It's always hard to practise euthanasia and it's emotionally taxing for the doctor. You choose the profession to provide optimal care and euthanasia may be a part of it. A doctor only practises euthanasia out of empathy for the patient who requests it."

Dr. Donker should consider that it is difficult for a physician to euthanize their patients because humans appear to have an innate repulsion to killing others. Nivel should be promoting effective care and symptom management for every person in the Netherlands rather than greater access to euthanasia.

Link to the article: http://www.rnw.nl/english/article/no-increase-euthanasia-legalisation

David Cameron will oppose the legalization of assisted suicide in the UK

David Cameron, the leader of the conservative party in the UK, has stated in the UK media that he opposes the legalization of assisted suicide.

Speaking to The Catholic Herald, Cameron stated:

"My personal view is that if assisted dying is legalised, there is a danger that terminally ill people may feel pressurised into ending their lives if they feel they've become a burden on loved ones,"

"I don't believe anyone should be put in this position. So no, I don't support any change in the law."

Now that an election has been called in the UK, the position of a politician on the issue of assisted suicide has become particularly relevant and should be an issue that many people use as a barometer to determine how they will vote.

The issue of assisted suicide is particularly relevant since Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions in the UK, released assisted suicide guidelines that make it less-likely that a person will be prosecuted for assisted suicide if they are a family member or if the person who died had a disability.

Cameron is currently the front-runner in the election, but like any political campaign, it is anybodies race until the vote is cast.

Page's death puts spotlight on euthanasia

An article from New Zealand that is written by Emma Joliff sadly reminds us of the tragedy that occurred five years ago with the death of Terri Schiavo, who like Margaret Page, died of dehydration.

The difference between Page and Schiavo is that Terri could not have chosen to die by dehydration whereas sadly, Margaret Page willingly dehydrated herself to death.

The article states:

There is fresh debate around euthanasia following the death of Margaret Page, who had refused food for more than two weeks.

The 60-year-old suffered a disabling haemorrhage 19 years ago, and euthanasia supporters say her decision should never have been made public.

Ms Page led an active, outdoor life before suffering her crippling brain haemorrhage.

A euthanasia advocate says starvation is a painful and distressing death, and there should have been a more humane alternative.

It should be noted that Margaret Page did not die of starvation but rather dehydration, nonetheless, the tragedy is not that Page did not have the option of being killed by lethal injection but rather that she felt that dying by dehydration was preferable to living with the care that was available to her.

Lesley Martin leader of pro-euthanasia group Dignity NZ stated:

While starving yourself is ethically challenging, it's not illegal.

Margaret Page was admitted to disability facility St John of God four years ago

St John of God commented by saying:

"Food and water had been offered to Mrs Page by staff members whenever they went into her room and at regular intervals. Mrs Page maintained her resolve to refuse food until the very end of her life."

Sadly, Margaret Page felt that her life was not worth living. The reality is that she refused food and fluids, an situation which is different than Terri Schiavo who was denied food and fluids.

The Page story is not a reason to consider legalizing euthanasia or assisted suicide but rather to provide greater care for people who live with debilitating conditions as well as the need for greater mental health services.

Link to the article: http://www.3news.co.nz/Pages-death-puts-spotlight-on-euthanasia/tabid/423/articleID/148998/Default.aspx

Elder Abuse In and Out of Nursing Homes a Growing Problem

The Australian government has released a new report concerning the increased incidence of Elder Abuse. Greater awareness concerning the crime of elder abuse is necessary in the same way as greater awareness of the crime of child abuse has led to effective prevention strategies.

There is a serious problem within society, care homes, and behind the closed doors of family life concerning the care of the elderly. Whether it be inappropriate care in long-term care facilities or family members abusing elder family members, I believe that the solution to the problem is only beginning.

The euthanasia lobby actually believe that legalizing euthanasia and/or assisted suicide will not lead to the ultimate elder abuse(death by supposed choice) is ridiculous.

At the same time the euthanasia lobby intentionally promotes vaguely worded legislation to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide based on the ideology that they need to make the legislation appear to have safeguards without the safeguards actually having teeth. In other words, the euthanasia lobby is only interested in making legislation appear to have safeguards because actual safeguards may prevent them from being killed when they don't "qualify" for death but are just tired of living.

Francine Lalonde introduced Bill C-384, to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide in Canada, with vague and conflicting language. She fears for her future and wishes to have someone kill her by euthanasia and she wouldn't want the wording of her bill to actually create a safeguard or a hurdle that may prevent her from being killed by euthanasia.

I accurately state - being killed, because euthanasia is when another person, usually a physician, is given the legal right to cause your death by lethal injection, or some other means.

Anyway, please read the article. The statistics are startling and the reality should upset us. Elder abuse is inflicted upon those who have built our society and the mothers who raised us.

Australian Department of Health and Ageing has released a new report which shows an alarming rise in physical assaults on the elderly in nursing homes: physical assaults increased by more than 50% and sexual assaults by 36%.

Physical and sexual assaults on our elderly in nursing homes is a problem in the United States as well. Earlier this month the Chicago Tribune reported on the widespread problem within the state of Illinois.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has dated statistics on elderly abuse -- “A study conducted in 1996 found that more than 500,000 persons age 60 years and older were the victims of abuse or neglect during a one-year period.”

As baby boomers age, the sheer number of elder persons makes the risk of elderly abuse a national problem.

Elder abuse is defined as any knowing, intentional, or negligent act by a caregiver or any other person that causes harm or a serious risk of harm to a vulnerable adult. Laws and definitions of terms vary considerably from one state to another, but broadly defined, abuse may be:

1. Physical Abuse - inflicting physical pain or injury on a senior, e.g. slapping, bruising, or restraining by physical or chemical means.
2. Sexual Abuse - non-consensual sexual contact of any kind.
3. Neglect - the failure by those responsible to provide food, shelter, health care, or protection for a vulnerable elder.
4. Exploitation - the illegal taking, misuse, or concealment of funds, property, or assets of a senior for someone else's benefit.
5. Emotional Abuse - inflicting mental pain, anguish, or distress on an elder person through verbal or nonverbal acts, e.g. humiliating, intimidating, or threatening.
6. Abandonment - desertion of a vulnerable elder by anyone who has assumed the responsibility for care or custody of that person.
7. Self-neglect
– characterized as the failure of a person to perform essential, self-care tasks and that such failure threatens his/her own health or safety.

Often the elderly will suffer in silence, especially if the caregiver is the abuser. Some tell-tale signs that there could be a problem are:

1. Bruises, pressure marks, broken bones, abrasions, and burns may be an indication of physical abuse, neglect, or mistreatment. Be especially wary if the bruises are around the breast or genital areas, as these may indicate sexual abuse.
2. Unexplained withdrawal from normal activities, a sudden change in alertness, and unusual depression may be indicators of emotional abuse.
3. Bedsores, unattended medical needs, poor hygiene, and unusual weight loss are indicators of possible neglect.
4. Strained or tense relationships, frequent arguments between the caregiver and elderly person are also signs.
5. If you suspect abuse, report it. If the danger is immediate, call 911 or the police.

To report elder abuse, contact the Adult Protective Services (APS) agency in the state where the elder resides. You can find the APS reporting number for each state by:

Visiting the “Hotline” section of the National Center on Elder Abuse website

Sources
theAge.com.au
Administration on Aging (AOA)
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Link to the article:
http://www.emaxhealth.com/1024/28/36197/elder-abuse-and-out-nursing-homes-growing-problem.html

To kill or not to kill?

George Webster, a clinical ethicist, Health Care Ethics Service, at St. Boniface General Hospital and CIHR member, wrote an article that was published in the Winnipeg Free Press on March 22, 2010.

Webster begins his article by making reference to the program - The Suicide Tourist that was recently aired on PBS. He then comments on Bill C-384, the bill that would legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide in Canada.

Webster continues by explaining why some people support the legalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide and then he explains why others oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide.

Webster looks at the issue in a fair and balanced manner. He is concerned about what is best for the country, for physicians and for patient care. Webster makes this conclusion:

What to do? I believe we can "care well" for the dying and terminally ill in our society without intentionally bringing about their deaths or assisting in their suicides. Often, those who gravitate toward euthanasia or assisted suicide do so because they fear they will lose control of decisions at the end of their lives. They may have witnessed family members dying with little control over decisions or they may have witnessed loved ones die in great pain.

Via their words and actions, health-care professionals and health-care organizations must assure patients and families they will be involved in a meaningful way with decisions about their care. Patients must be assured they will not be abandoned, left to die in isolation and/or excluded from important choices at the end of life.

In our time, no one need die in this way. Fear of loss of control and fear of a painful, protracted dying process are basic issues for all in this debate. However, all too often in the discussion of assisted suicide the public is presented with two scenarios -- a death characterized by loss of control and unrelieved pain and suffering or a peaceful, calm death. This is, quite simply, a crude and simplistic caricature.

Assisting the suicide of those in our community who are dying and/or others who may be struggling with mental anguish eliminates tragedy and suffering by eliminating the sufferer. Rather than being an expression of mercy or respect, communal endorsement of euthanasia and assisted suicide is the ultimate abandonment of the person.

Palliative care is a viable alternative to euthanasia and assisted suicide. The philosophy of palliative care encourages each patient to live to the fullest as they confront their own unique dying. Palliative care demonstrates death is a communal event and not simply a private matter. Those working in palliative care bring specialized skills to respond to pain, psychological distress and the spiritual needs of patients and their families.

If we are to truly honour and respect those among us who are dying, or those whose hold on life is weakened by disease or suffering, then we must keep company with these people and respond in concrete ways that communicate faithfulness and attentiveness.

Link to the article at: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/westview/to-kill-or-not-to-kill-88801087.html

Complications with assisted suicide in Oregon and Washington states

An article that is written by Harris Meyer for crosscut.com examines the complications in the first year assisted suicide report in Washington State and the report from Oregon.

The article states:

Reports show some patients had troubles with end-of-life procedures, but complications were rare. Advocates say they'll work to better publicize proper methods.

There may need to be some tinkering with the machinery of death.

It is important about that people learn that there may be more complications than reported in Oregon and Washington states but due to the control that is exerted by Compassion & Choices and the fact that rarely is the physician, who prescribed the lethal dose, present at the assisted suicide death.

After the death occurs the physician who prescribed the lethal dose is then required to submit the report, but how would the physician know that complications occured when the physician is rarely present at the time of death.

Compassion & Choices suggested that with more information the complication rate will drop. The article stated:

“We’re concerned because we want this to work well and properly,” said Dr. Tom Preston, a retired Seattle cardiologist who serves as Compassion’s medical director in Washington. “The more we can get information out there on doing it correctly, particularly to doctors, the better it works out.”

Eileen Geller, the leader of True Compassionate Advocates, was quoted in the article as stating:

“This is marketed by Compassion and Dr. Preston as a peaceful means of dying,” said Eileen Geller, a Seattle hospice nurse who heads True Compassion Advocates, which tries to steer people away from assisted suicide. “But this type of death is cruel and unusual.”

The article described the complications in this manner:

One terminally ill Washington patient who took the lethal prescription vomited up part of it because he had swilled six cans of Pepsi, his favorite drink, in the hour before taking the drug, Preston said. He got that information from the patient’s physician, who wasn’t there but heard it from people who were present. The patient woke up and fell back asleep several times before finally dying 28 hours later — the longest time to death reported among the 36 Washingtonians who died in 2009 after ingesting the drug.

The other Washington case with complications was a terminally ill woman who swallowed the drug too slowly because she kept stopping to say goodbye to the people around her, Preston said. She fell asleep after drinking less than half the full cocktail, then awakened before later dying. The lethal drug used in assisted dying in Washington and Oregon is either oral secobarbital or pentobarbital, mixed with a sweet-tasting liquid or custard.

Compassion & Choices try to control the implementation of the assisted suicide law by facilitating most of the deaths and ensuring that their volunteers are present at the time of death to ensure that death occurs. The article stated:

Compassion had a volunteer present in 80 percent of the Washington cases where patients ingested the lethal drug last year, and there were no reported complications in those cases, Preston said.

The author of the article let Compassion & Choices promote its services:

“When we have a trained volunteer present, the average time to sleep is five minutes and the average time to dying is 25 minutes,” he said. “Like any medical procedure, there’s a right way to do it. Even when patients and their families have been adequately instructed, it can misfire if there isn’t someone knowledgable there watching.”

In Oregon, there was one reported regurgitation out of the 59 deaths under the law in 2009; there have been 20 out of 460 cases since that state’s pioneering Death with Dignity law took effect in 1998. Over that entire period, just one patient was reported to have awakened after taking the drug, about four years ago.

According to George Eighmey, Compassion’s executive director in Oregon, doctors later concluded that patient woke up because he had taken a laxative to mask the bitter taste of the lethal drug, which prevented his body from absorbing the drug quickly enough. When he awoke after being asleep for 65 hours, there were no signs of pain, and he ended up dying of his underlying disease two weeks later.
In Oregon George Eighmey was willing to talk about two cases. I ask George, what about the other, unreported cases? Eighmey stated:

Oregon reported one Death with Dignity patient last year who took a record 104 hours to die. “The doctors we talked to said it’s likely she just had a very strong heart,” Eighmey said.

There’s no indication that people who have taken longer to die have suffered, Eighmey said; they look relaxed and sleep soundly. In one case last year, however, family members noticed the patient “grimacing or twitching,” he acknowledged. “They were concerned afterward, but the person still died without awakening.”

Compassion & Choices will boast about the way they control the law but the Oregon government should be concerned that the only people who know how the law actually works is Compassion & Choices the article stated:

Eighmey boasts that last year Compassion had volunteers present during 57 of the 59 assisted-dying cases in Oregon, up from around 80 percent over the previous years. “More and more hospices and medical providers are aware of our organization and appreciate our facilitating that process,” he said.

The other fact is that there are no penalties when the mandatory physician reporting forms are not submitted. The fact that there are a few irregularities with the reporting forms means that Compassion & Choices will simply be more careful next year to cover up the lack of reporting. The article states:

In Washington, there is concern that mandatory physician reporting forms on two of the 63 Washington patients who received lethal medication prescriptions from their doctors weren’t filed in time for the 2009 annual report. In addition, there were four missing after-death forms from physicians — making it impossible to know whether four of the 47 patients who received the prescription and subsequently died expired from ingesting the lethal drug or from other causes.

“The law doesn’t provide specific enforcement authority but we are calling doctors to ask them if they forgot to send the forms,” said Donn Moyer, a spokesman for the Washington Department of Health.

Eileen Geller commented on the reporting:

“We don’t know who died from the medication, and there’s no penalty for not reporting,” she said.

She argues that elderly and disabled people are being pressured by relatives to choose assisted suicide for financial reasons, and that providers are being told they can’t report this as elder abuse due to the Death with Dignity law. She said she knows of one case last year where a woman suffering from moderate diabetes wanted to stop taking her insulin to qualify for Death with Dignity; when a hospice nurse told her she didn’t qualify under the requirement that patients be terminally ill with six months to live, a Compassion & Choices volunteer called and berated the nurse.

Preston didn't agree with Geller's assertion:

Preston called Geller’s charge against Compassion a “baseless and unsubstantiated claim,” saying, “we would never consider working with such a patient except to advise her that she didn’t qualify under the law.”

The article then glossed over the similarities and differences between the Washington and Oregon experience with assisted suicide.

Overall, Washington’s experience in the first year of its law was quite comparable to Oregon’s, according to the state reports. The large majority of patients who received the lethal prescriptions had terminal cancer, were white, had some college education, were covered by health insurance, and were concerned about loss of autonomy, loss of dignity, and inability to participate in activities that made life enjoyable.

One difference was that 72 percent of the Washington patients were enrolled in hospice care, compared with 92 percent in Oregon. Both supporters and opponents of the Death with Dignity law urge terminally ill patients to take advantage of hospice to receive palliative care and pain relief, which may dissuade them from seeking assisted suicide. Experts say awareness and use of hospice and palliative care has increased since Oregon’s Death with Dignity law took effect.

Critics have said not enough patients undergo psychological evaluations to determine whether they are competent to use the Death with Dignity law. Last year, according to the state reports, doctors ordered evaluations for three Washington patients who later received lethal prescriptions; in Oregon there were none. Preston and Eighmey noted, however, that other patients — three in Washington and five in Oregon — received evaluations and never got the lethal prescriptions. That wasn’t reported to the states, which only require reporting of cases where patients received the drug.

In one such case, Preston was skeptical about the patient’s competence but the attending doctor initially was reluctant to order a psychological evaluation because it would take too much time. He ended up ordering the test. “The doctor said it turned out to be very helpful,” Preston said. “The patient was too far out of it.”

Link to the article: http://crosscut.com/2010/03/23/health-medicine/19689/

‘Pulling the plug’ isn’t euthanasia

The Ottawa Citizen printed an excellent article by Margaret Somerville on Friday entitled: Pulling the plug isn't euthanasia.

I have been fighting a phantom ever since the Quebec College of Physicians decided that Canada needs to legalize euthanasia and then compared euthanasia to ending life-sustaining medical treatment.

The law clearly allows physicians to withdraw or withhold medical treatment that is futile, burdensome, inappropriate, etc. This is not euthanasia unless it is necessary care that is withheld or withdrawn against the consent of the person.

The important point in this article is that there is a difference between killing and letting die. The other natural difference between killing and letting die is that when you let someone die, sometimes (not often) they don't die and often they don't die immediately. When you give someone a lethal dose by euthanasia, that person will die from the lethal dose and usually within a short period of time.

Somerville wrote:
Recently, I saw an illustration that accompanied an article about euthanasia. It showed the silhouette of a patient lying on a bed. There was an electrical outlet on the wall behind the bed and an unplugged connecting cord hanging down over the side of the bed.

Except in very rare circumstances — for instance, if the treatment were withdrawn without the necessary consent or against the patient’s wishes — withdrawal of life-support treatment is not euthanasia. Yet many people, including the artist who penned this illustration and many health-care professionals, mistakenly believe that it is.

In my experience, they are confused with respect to the ethical and legal differences between withdrawal of treatment that results in death and euthanasia, and why the former can be ethically and legally acceptable, provided certain conditions are fulfilled, and the latter cannot be. This is a central and important distinction in the euthanasia debate, which needs to be understood.

Failure to understand it leads, among other problems, to physicians responding affirmatively to surveys that ask them whether they or their colleagues have carried out euthanasia, when in fact they have not, and members of the public saying they agree with euthanasia, because they agree with people’s rights to refuse medical treatment.

First, the primary intention is different in the two cases: In withdrawing life-support treatment the primary intention is to respect the patient’s right to refuse treatment; in euthanasia it is to kill the patient. The former intention is ethically and legally acceptable; the latter is not.

Patients have a right to refuse treatment, even if that means they will die. They have a right not to be touched, including through medical treatment, without their consent — a right to inviolability. This right protects a person’s physical integrity and can also function to protect physical and mental privacy. The right to inviolability is one aspect of every competent adult’s right to autonomy and self-determination.

Pro-euthanasia advocates use recognition of this right to refuse treatment even when it results in death to argue that, likewise, patients should be allowed to exercise their right to autonomy and self-determination to choose death through lethal injection. They say that there is no morally or ethically significant difference between these situations, and there ought to be no legal difference.

They found their argument by wrongly characterizing the right to refuse treatment as a “right to die,” and then generalize that right to include dying through euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide. But the right to refuse treatment is not a “right to die” and does not establish any such right, although death results from respecting the patient’s right to inviolability. The right to refuse treatment can be validly characterized as a “right to be allowed to die,” but this is quite different from a right to be killed that euthanasia would establish.

Moreover, a “right to be allowed to die by refusing treatment,” is a “negative content” right — a right against one’s integrity being breached without one’s consent. In contrast, a “right to die” through access to euthanasia would be a “positive content” right — that is, a right to something. In general, the law is very much more reluctant to recognize positive content rights, than negative content ones.

This pro-euthanasia line of argument is yet one more example of promoting euthanasia through deliberate confusion between interventions, such as valid refusals of treatment, that are not euthanasia and those that are.

This brings us to the issue of legal causation, which also differentiates refusals-of-treatment-that-result-in-death from euthanasia. In the former, the person dies from their underlying disease — a natural death. The withdrawal of treatment is the occasion on which death occurs, but not its cause. If the person had no fatal illness, they would not die. We can see that when patients who refuse treatment and are expected to die, do not die. In contrast, in euthanasia death is certain and the cause of death is the lethal injection. Without that, the person would not die at that time from that cause.

The fact that the patient dies both in refusing treatment and in euthanasia is one of the sources of the confusion between the two. If we focus just on the fact that in both cases the outcome is death, we miss the real point of distinction between death resulting from refusing treatment and from euthanasia.

The issue in the euthanasia debate is not if we die — we all eventually die. The issue is how we die and whether some means of dying, such as euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, should remain legally prohibited. In order to maintain that they should, we need to be able to show how currently accepted practices, such as respect for patients’ refusals of treatment, are not euthanasia and differ from it and assisted suicide.

Margaret Somerville is director of the Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law at McGill University, and author of The Ethical Imagination: Journeys of the Human Spirit.

Link to the article at: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/health/Pulling+plug+euthanasia/2704966/story.html

Minnesota nurse to be prosecuted for his role in counselling suicide deaths.

An article in yesterday's Daily Mail newspaper in the UK confirms that William Melchert-Dinkel, the Minnesota nurse who admitted to being an internet suicide predator, will be charged with encouraging others to commit suicide.

Melchert-Dinkel has admitted to being involved with the suicide death of Nadia Kajouji, the 18 year-old first-year student at Carlton University in Ottawa in March 2008. Kajouji died by drowning after establishing a suicide pact with Melchert-Dinkel who claimed to be a female nurse from Minnesota.

You will notice by the comment from Deborah Chevalier (below the blog entry) that the article had some false comments. Melchert-Dinkel has not been charged yet, even though they expect that he will.

The article stated that:

Melchert-Dinkel, a married father of two, allegedly spent years posing as a young woman who may have contacted more than 100 desperate people across the world.

‘Most important is the placement of the noose on the neck,’ he allegedly wrote in one web chat. He then went on to detail where to place the knot ‘for instant unconsciousness and death.’

He has allegedly admitted to U.S police that he was involved in at least four deaths, including that of an 18-year-old Canadian student Nadia Kajouji.

Melchert-Dinkel also admitted to establishing a suicide pact with Mark Drybrough an IT technician from Coventry in the UK to commit suicide in June 2005. The article stated:

Mr Drybrough’s mother Elaine said that she believed that Melchert-Dinkel appointed himself as her son’s ‘executioner’.

Mark Drybrough killed himself at his home in Coventry in June 2005
‘Mark had had a nervous breakdown and he was depressed and incredibly susceptible,’ she said.

‘This person was there whispering in his ear every time he logged on. In the last email, this person claimed to be a nurse, saying he had medical training, and proposed a suicide pact.’

Mrs Dryborough eventually tracked down Mr Melchert-Dinkel with the help of a Wiltshire youth worker, Celia Blay, who discovered that dozens of people had received similar emails to Mark’s.

Celia Blay worked hard on her own to uncover Melchert-Dinkel's activities:

Mrs Blay had been enraged when a 13-year-old friend of hers had told her that she had made a suicide pact with a female nurse called Li Dao

Mrs Blay contacted members of internet groups used by Li Dao and discovered that she used the pseudonyms Falcon Girl and Cami D.

Li Dao would persuade people to enter pacts in which they would hang themselves in front of internet webcams and watch each other die.

But at the crucial moment there was always a problem with Li Dao’s webcam.

Mrs Blay said: ‘We found out everything about him on Google, including where he lived in Minnesota.’

She added: ‘He befriended them using a female identity, was very loving and sympathetic, but never suggested an alternative to death, even when they were only teenagers.

‘He’d tell them that he intended to kill himself too, and said they should set up a web camera and he would do the same thing so they could watch each other die over the internet.’

‘It took months and months to collect the evidence but when I went to the police [close to her home, which was then at Maidenhead, Berkshire] they just said if it bothers you, look the other way,’ she said.

At this point Melchert-Dinkel has only been disciplined by the Minnesota nurses association who revoked his right to be a nurse. The article stated:

The Minnesota Board of Nursing, which revoked Melchert-Dinkel's licence in June last year, said he encouraged numerous people to commit suicide and told at least one person his job as a nurse made him an expert on the most effective way to do it.

His medical notes record that he told nurses that he was addicted to suicide chat rooms and had ‘posed as a 28 yo female formed suicide pacts with some that he had no attention [sic] of following thru . . . 4 yrs suicide fetish offered medical advice for assisted suicide x2’.

Harold Albrecht MP, (Kitchener-Conestoga) unanimously steered Motion 388 through Canada's parliament to urge the Canadian government to take action in the death of Nadia Kajouji and to protect Canadians from internet suicide predators.

Link to the article at: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1259379/The-suicide-voyeur-nurse-encouraged-people-kill-online.html#ixzz0ioCWmlI0

Doctor Death continues to promote veterinarian drugs for suicide

Philip Nitschke, Australia's Dr Death, continues to promote the purchase of veterinarian euthanasia drugs for his supporters to use for suicide.

Philip Nitschke

An article published today in the Australian paper, Perth Now, explains that a source of Nembutal, a drug used in the euthanasia of animals, has been discovered in Thailand.

Nitschke has been irresponsible with his promotion of the use of Nembutal and this has resulted in large numbers of his supporters, as well as young healthy or depressed people also obtaining Nembutal to kill themselves.

A recent report from the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine researched 51 people who died from Nembutal in Australia. The report found that young people and depressed people were more likely to die by Nembutal than terminally ill people in Australia.

The report stated that of the 51 people who were known to have died from Nembutal, 6 people were in their 20's, 8 people were in their 30's, 5 people were in their 40's, 14 people were in their 50's, 3 people in their 60's, 10 in their 70's, and 5 people were over the age of 80.

Further to that, the report found that of the 38 known deaths that were investigated by a coroner, only 11 had a significant physical illness or chronic pain with the remaining 27 cases showing no signs of physical problems.

The report suggested that the 27 otherwise healthy people who died from Nembutal use were most likely depressed or mentall ill.

Link to my previous blog comment on this study: http://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2010/02/hoarding-death-drugs.html

With the continued promotion of Nembutal, Nitschke is proving that he doesn't care about the colateral damage that is caused by his promotion of Nembutal. People are travelling around the world obtaining Nembutal from veterinary clinics and putting their lives and the lives of others at risk.

Nitschke's irresponsibly promoting Nembutal for his own politcal gain without caring that vulnerable people are dying at the same time.

Link to the article in Perth Now: http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/cheap-flight-to-thailand-for-euthanasia-drugs/story-e6frg12c-1225843186159

Bill C-384 received its first-hour of debate on March 16th (again)

The first-hour of debate (again) on Bill C-384, the bill that is sponsored by Francine Lalonde (La Pointe-de-l'Île, BQ) to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide in Canada took place, yesterday on March 16, 2010.

Bill C-384 was introduced at first-reading on May 13, 2009. It had its first-hour of debate on October 2, 2009 and it was scheduled for its second-hour of debate for November 16, 2009. Lalonde then traded-backwards in the order of precedence three times to delay the second-hour of debate and vote on Bill C-384. Then Prime-Minister Harper prorogued parliament. Since C-384 had not been voted-on at second reading, therefore prorogation returned C-384 to requiring a first and second-hour of debate before it could be voted-on at Second Reading.

Lalonde’s strategy: Create confusion concerning Bill C-384, euthanasia and assisted suicide and pressure Members of Parliament (MP) to pass the bill at second reading and amendment it in committee.

Lalonde began her speech in parliament by annunciating her strategy to pressure MP’s to support Bill C-384 at second-reading and to amend it in committee. Lalonde stated:

“I think that studying my bill in committee and passing it after consideration and amendments would at last rid us of the criminal nature of physician-assisted dying by euthanasia or assisted suicide.”

Bill C-384 is fatally flawed. There is nothing redeeming or worth amending in the bill.

*Bill C-384 legalizes lethal injection for people who suffer chronic physical and mental pain even when the condition is treatable.

*Bill C-384 is not limited to competent people. It legalizes lethal injection for people who “appear to be lucid”. You are not required to be lucid only to appear to be lucid.

Lalonde then begins her second strategy which is to create confusion about what euthanasia and assisted suicide is and what Bill C-384 does. Lalonde states:

“In a context where any act aimed at shortening life is considered murder punishable by criminal sanctions, it is rather difficult to have an open and frank discussion on all the care that would be appropriate at the end of life.”

“The Canadian legal framework, the Criminal Code, stipulates that any action to end another person’s life constitutes murder and is therefore subject to criminal sanctions.”

Lalonde’s comments are false and misleading.

Euthanasia is when a person (usually a physician) directly and intentionally causes the death of another person, based on suffering. Euthanasia is usually done by lethal injection.

Assisted Suicide is when a person aids, abets or counsels a person to commit suicide. Assisted suicide is usually done by writing a prescription for a lethal dose.

Lalonde's statements relate to the false comments by the Quebec College of Physicians who argue that euthanasia needs to be legalized to protect doctors who use sedation techniques and large doses of morphine, acts that they claim are the same as euthanasia.

The proper use of morphine and other analgesics is not euthanasia. The proper use of analgesics will relieve a person of pain and if the rare and unintended consequence is the death of the person, then it is clearly not euthanasia but rather the reality that death is a natural end for the human person. The abuse of the use of analgesics may be euthanasia and should never be confused with the effective and proper use of morphine.

The proper use of sedation techniques are not euthanasia, but rather a good form of palliative care. When a person is properly sedated to relieve them of pain, this is not euthanasia, but the abuse of the use of sedation techniques may be euthanasia.

I am concerned that false and misleading comments concerning the proper use of sedation and analgesics to effectively control pain may lead some physicians to hesitate from using large doses of analgesics or hesitate from sedating a person who is experiencing painful symptoms. This would be a tragic.

Lalonde also asked the question: “What will the parliament of Canada do?” if the Quebec government commission that is seeking information on euthanasia and assisted suicide, introduces a motion in the Quebec legislature to legalize euthanasia?

Lalonde promotes the myth that her bill is strict and limited. She stated:

“My bill has a specific objective. It deals only with people capable of making decisions for themselves who are living in conditions of suffering that cannot be alleviated.“

“My bill is specific and limited”

Bill C-384 is wide open and uncontrollable.

It allows euthanasia (lethal injection) and assisted suicide (lethal prescription) for people who are experiencing physical or mental pain or terminally ill, who have accepted or rejected effective treatments, and who appear to be lucid.

Bill C-384 is not limited to terminally ill people. It allows euthanasia for someone who is experiencing chronic physical or mental pain, who have rejected effective treatment, even if that effective treatment was for chronic depression, and who appear to be lucid.

Bill C-384 would allow someone who lives with treatable chronic depression to be killed by lethal injection.

This is a bill that specifically targets people with disabilities who live with chronic conditions.

C-384 is a recipe for elder abuse. A person only needs to appear to be lucid and the bill does not require a witness at the time of death to ensure that the person who died, actually consented.

Lalonde is creating confusion about what euthanasia and assisted suicide is and what Bill C-384 does. She is pressuring MP’s to vote for Bill C-384 at second reading, even if they don’t actually support the bill, to allow the bill to be debated and amended in the justice committee.

Lalonde is constantly repeating a lie with the hope that the lie becomes accepted as a fact.

Bill C-384 needs to be defeated at second reading. Tell your MP to vote against Bill C-384.

Vancouver Sun and euthanasia lobby activist dissing disability activists

Stephen Drake from Not Dead Yet is not taking the crap from the euthanasia lobby, who are attempting to discount the opposition by people with disabilities to euthanasia and assisted suicide.

All I have to say is go get-em Stephen:

Read his comments:
Ann Neumann, writing on the Otherspoon blog, has stated in the past that she's inclined to shy away from direct criticism of disability rights groups like NDY in the "right to die" debate, seeing it as "a trap."

Neumann found a way around the "trap" last week by quoting someone else's work. Specifically, she quoted a "hit and miss" attempt at analysis of the impact of the disability rights movement in Canada published in the Vancouver Sun.

Here's the relevant portion of the article in regard to assisted suicide and euthanasia, which Neumann also shares on her blog:

The battle for disabled rights has had other unpredicted twists and turns.

One of them is over the so-called "right to die." As advocates for the disabled have continued battling for recognition, they have clashed with people who want laws in Canada and the U.S. permitting assisted suicide for those with severe disabilities and terminal conditions.

Even though polls show the majority of Canadians support regulated euthanasia, disability rights activists have strongly lobbied politicians to make sure no one, regardless of the severity of their disability, should be able to choose an assisted suicide.

In this increasingly bitter debate, disabled activists claim legalizing assisted suicide would be an ethical "slippery slope" that would lead to all disabled people, no matter the degree of their impairment, being devalued as human beings.

In turn, advocates for assisted suicide maintain the arguments of disabled-rights activists are a misplaced over-reaction to their proposals.

American readers should take careful note of the specific wording. The debate in Canada is not limited to advocacy of assisted suicide or euthanasia for the "terminally ill" alone. As I'll get to in a bit, it's not even limited to those who ask to die.

All the more curious that she'd highlight this, since one of her criticisms in her previous post responding (sort of) to Not Dead Yet, contained this:

As to the provision of rights to one group infringing on the rights of another, that's just bad thinking too. Giving a mentally-sound, terminal patient with less than six the right to a lethal prescription that they may or may not choose to take when death approaches has nothing to do with the disabled community. Again, I sympathize with the fear and vulnerability the disabled community feels toward the medical industry, the state, and society. But conflating two separate issues is just bad advocacy. With a little (understandable) paranoia thrown in.

Paranoia? Certainly not in Canada.

See, the reporter at the Vancouver Sun didn't do his homework. The one single case that galvanized the disability community in Canada in regard to this issue was the murder of a disabled 12-year-old girl by her father, who claimed it was a "mercy killing" after failing to pass her death off as a natural one. Robert Latimer, who gassed his daughter Tracy in the cab of his truck, had many defenders - including members of the "right to die" movement in Canada.

Ruth von Fuchs, current president of the Right to Die Society of Canada, had some pretty unambiguous quotes during the trial of Robert Latimer:

Proponents of euthanasia say that, until proper legal and social supports are in place, many people, like Latimer, have to take the law into their own hands. "This law is being written unofficially in emergency rooms and intensive care wards every night," says Ruth von Fuchs, a member of the Right to Die Society in Toronto. Von Fuchs views Tracy's death as part of a "continuum" that begins with brain-damaged infants, some so severely handicapped that doctors quietly remove life support within hours of birth. It is unfortunate, she adds, that because mercy killing has been "criminalized," Latimer felt he had to act alone, without the help of a social worker or medical expert. Von Fuchs, and other members of the euthanasia movement, is calling for a change in attitude to mercy killing. "In our society, we forbid people to give up," she argues. "We say, 'Never say die,' but sometimes you have to stand back and realize that really is a cliché. We cannot fix everyone every time forever."

You want a clearer statement from a leader in the Canadian "right to die" movement? Here is an excerpt from a 1997 NY Times article quoting the late Marilyn Seguin, then the executive director of of the Canadian group Dying with Dignity:

Marilynne Seguin, executive director of Dying With Dignity, a Toronto-based group promoting freedom of choice for physician-assisted deaths, said that the Latimers had already lived under a sentence during the 12 years that Tracy was alive and that to add the 10-year punishment "is quite unconscionable." (emphasis added.)

Going back to the original article, opposition of disability rights activists - and mistrust of the motives of euthanasia advocates - might seem less like an "overreaction" and more an appropriate reaction with more information.

The Vancouver Sun reporter failed to supply a full context for the nature of the real debate here - through laziness, sloppiness or reasons unknown. Whether Neumann found this appealing due to true ignorance or a simple wish to use misinformation is anyone's guess. But even with the limited information available in the article, she certainly can't accuse disability activists of conflating "terminal illness" with "disability." Disability is openly on the agenda of the euthanasia proponents in Canada.

It is here in the US as well. The larger organizations just favor an incrementalist approach and are a little embarrassed by the recently publicized more radical activities of the Final Exit Network. --Stephen Drake

Link to the comments on the Not Dead Yet blog:
http://notdeadyetnewscommentary.blogspot.com/2010/03/ann-neumann-and-vancouver-sun-dissing.html

When is euthanasia justified?

The Globe and Mail, Canada's national newspaper, published an excellent article by Margaret Somerville yesterday.

The article asks the rhetorical question, When is euthanasia justified?

Somerville answers the question with the reality of the practice of euthanasia in other jurisdictions.

Somerville stated:
Francine Lalonde's private member's bill to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide will be back in Parliament tomorrow.

For millennia, euthanasia (a word I use to include assisted suicide) has been considered morally and legally unjustifiable. People who oppose euthanasia still believe it's inherently wrong – it can't be morally justified and even compassionate motives don't make it ethically acceptable.

But what are the attitudes of pro-euthanasia advocates regarding whether its use needs to be justified, were it to be legalized? And, if justifications are required, what are they?

People who would accept euthanasia, but only in some circumstances, usually limit its access to people who are terminally ill, in serious unrelievable pain and suffering, and require that euthanasia be used as a last resort. These limitations show these people believe each case of euthanasia needs moral justification to be ethically acceptable.

But although the need for euthanasia to relieve pain and suffering is the justification given, and the one the public accepts in supporting its legalization, research shows that dying people request euthanasia far more frequently because of fear of social isolation and of being a burden on others, than pain. So, should avoiding loneliness or being a burden count as a sufficient justification?

Recently, some pro-euthanasia advocates have gone further, arguing that respect for people's rights to autonomy and self-determination means competent adults have a right to die at a time of their choosing, and the state has no right to prevent them from doing so. In other words, if euthanasia were legalized, the state has no right to require a justification for its use by competent, freely consenting adults.

For example, they believe an elderly couple, where the husband is seriously ill and the wife healthy, should be allowed to carry out their suicide pact. As Ruth von Fuchs, head of the Right to Die Society of Canada, stated, “life is not an obligation.” But although Ms. von Fuchs thought the wife should have an unfettered right to assisted suicide, she argued that it would allow her to avoid the suffering, grief and loneliness associated with losing her husband – that is, she articulated a justification.

We can see this same trend toward not requiring a justification – or, at least, nothing more than that's what a competent person over a certain age wants to do – in the Netherlands. Last month, a group of older Dutch academics and politicians launched a petition in support of assisted suicide for the over-70s who [ OMIT are] “consider their lives complete” and want to die. They quickly attracted more than 100,000 signatures, far more than needed to get the issue debated in parliament under citizens' initiative legislation.

And what about avoiding health-care costs as a justification? Although this question has largely been dodged – one could say “religiously” – by pro-euthanasia advocates, euthanasia could be used as a cost-saving measure, and is likely to be if legalized.

Half of the lifetime health-care costs of the average person are incurred in the last six months of the person's life. Euthanasia would be a way to implement a “reasonably well or dead” approach – sometimes referred to as “squaring the curve” of health decline at the end of life, so the person drops precipitously from being reasonably well to dead – which would avoid those costs.

The medical authority of the U.S. state of Oregon – where physician-assisted suicide is legal – seems to have adopted this approach. Shortly before he died this month, Montreal journalist Hugh Anderson wrote in The Gazette that Oregon “has acknowledged that when it turns down an application to cover the cost of an expensive new drug, it sends out simultaneously a reminder that the state's assisted suicide program is available at an affordable cost.” As Mr. Anderson noted, “What a great way to put a crimp in medical costs. Have the patients kill themselves when the cost of keeping us alive gets too high.”

The Netherlands' 30-year experience with euthanasia shows clearly the rapid expansion, in practice, of what is seen as an acceptable justification for euthanasia.

Initially, euthanasia was limited to terminally ill, competent adults, with unrelievable pain and suffering, who repeatedly asked for euthanasia and gave their informed consent to it. Now, none of those requirements necessarily applies, in some cases not even in theory and, in others, not in practice.

For instance, parents of severely disabled babies can request euthanasia for them, 12- to 16-year-olds can obtain euthanasia with parental consent and those over 16 can give their own consent. More than 500 deaths a year, where the adult was incompetent or consent not obtained, result from euthanasia. And late middle-aged men (a group at increased risk for suicide) may be using it as a substitute for suicide.

Indeed, one of the people responsible for shepherding through the legislation legalizing euthanasia in the Netherlands recently admitted publicly that doing so had been a serious mistake, because, she said, once legalized, euthanasia cannot be controlled. In other words, justifications for it expand greatly, even to the extent that simply a personal preference “to be dead” will suffice.

Legalizing euthanasia causes death and dying to lose the moral context within which they must be viewed. Maintaining that moral context is crucial in light of an aging population and scarce and increasingly expensive health-care resources, which will present us with increasingly difficult ethical decisions.

Link to the article in the Globe and Mail: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/when-is-euthanasia-justified/article1499212/

Dutch petition to permit the killing by euthanasia of healthy people over 70 gets 100,000 signatures

By Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director 
Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

An article that was published in the Daily Telegraph stated that a lobby group has got 100,000 signatures demanding that the Dutch government allow euthanasia and assisted suicide for people who are over the age of 70 for any and all reasons "tired of living".

The Dutch euthanasia lobby has been pushing for euthanasia for those who are "tired of living" as their "final solution" for many years. 

When I attended the World Federation of Right to Die Societies Conference in Toronto in September 2006, the leader of the NVVE - Dutch euthanasia society, stated that he was concerned that activism on the part of the euthanasia lobby should be discouraged because it would prevent their group from achieving the final goal - euthanasia for those who are "tired of living." At the same conference Philip Nitschke, Australia's Dr. Death, asked the question, why should we not have euthanasia available to those who are "tired of living."

My mom turns 70 this year. She is a great dutch woman and she has always put other people ahead of herself in life. Women like her should never be told, even subtly, that they are "better off dead".

Our mothers continue to want the best for us, even after we have grown up. It would be easy to convince some of them that death is preferable than living with special needs. These women will feel that by agreeing to euthanasia they are doing "what is best for their children".

Oh by the way - It would be a free choice for these elderly women? Bull! This is the prime example of how choice is a lie and assisted suicide and euthanasia are a "recipe for elder abuse." In this case, choice is simply a slogan and not a reality.

The 100,000 people who signed the petition urging the government to allow "doctors" to lethally inject or provide lethal doses to our elderly mothers should be ashamed of themselves. They represent the most uncaring, self-centred, group of people that have ever lived.

This whole concept is based on a few academics who philosophically believe that death is the ultimate freedom. They really don't care that their philosophy threatens the lives of the many so the few white wealthy academics can say - "I am free".

It is bad enough that they allow euthanasia in general, but to simply say - "Oh by the way I am tired of living, give me the Kool-Aid" is ridiculous at best.

Link to the article at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/7414590/Dutch-plan-to-let-healthy-elderly-people-commit-suicide.html

True Compassion Advocates - Press Advisory - Washington State Assisted Suicide Report

Press Advisory
True Compassion Advocates

One Year Anniversary Protest - March 3rd, 2010

Protest of Assisted Suicide law to be held Friday, March 5th at University of Washington Medical Center

The first anniversary of the implementation of Washington's Death With Dignity Act is Friday, March 5th. A supportive care demonstration will gather in front of the UW Medical Center to protest the legalization of assisted suicide. From 12 noon to 1pm, protestors will line the sidewalk near the front of the hospital at 1959 N.E. Pacific Street.

According to Eileen Geller, RN, BSN, President of True Compassion Advocates, protestors will "stand in solidarity with seniors, people with disabilities, and other victims of the 'collateral damage' caused by legalizing assisted suicide in this state."

Over 52 Washingtonians have died under the Death with Dignity Act since the law was implemented. There were a total of 80 requests for assisted suicide, and 72 lethal drug overdoses dispensed, according to the March 2, 2010 statistics from Washington State Department of Health. Of the 80 requests, only four people received psychiatric consults assessing them for untreated clinical depression, a common problem among those with serious and chronic illnesses. Geller stated that: "I can only hope all the reported assisted suicides were not the result of untreated depression or someone else's choice." She added: "Unfortunately, given the flimsy reporting standards and potentially coercive provisions of the DWD Act, there is no way to know for sure."

The TCA president believes the overall number of people adversely affected by the Act is much higher than the official count of assisted suicides gathered by DOH. In the last year, her organization has received increasing reports of 'the collateral damage' from the DWDA, including calls about seniors who feel increased pressure to commit suicide or assisted suicide. They have also heard from health care professionals worried about vulnerable adults being adversely impacted by the "duty to die" climate fostered by the Act.

Geller, a longtime hospice nurse, stated: "These calls are an indicator of abuse. I've spoken to patients for whom this pressure is very real. With the rates of elder abuse and financial exploitation climbing, Washington's legalization of assisted suicide has created increased stress on vulnerable adults. With state budget cuts and a tough economy, the 'choice,' promised by the Death With Dignity Act, quickly becomes illusory."

"The need for creating and maintaining in our communities assisted suicide-free 'safe harbors' has never been greater," Geller emphasized. Hospitals, such as the UW, which 'opted in' to allowing assisted suicide in their facilities, along with nursing homes and adult family homes, are hearing from patients, families, and community members. They are saying that they want safe, competent care, but not assisted suicide," she stressed.

Link to the press advisory: http://www.truecompassionadvocates.org/press9.html