How long can people live like this?

I absolutely understand what you are saying and in a perfect world we would feel no remorse, but of course the whole assisted dying is fraught with danger.
Its just too open to corruption right now in my eyes.
I hope that we can find a middle path such as no intervention and pain relief but I know what you mean.

Yes but it’s upsetting to themselves.

Care homes are big business. I pray I go before I ever have to step foot in one.

The botched execution is because pharmaceutical companies companies won’t allow drugs to be used in death penalty cases. So the drugs are sourced from compounders which is dodgy as fuck. Licenced doctors / nurses are prohibited from participating by their medical bodies.

So essentially you have drugs sourced from whoever will make with no guarantee to their efficacy and staff who are not licensed medical professionals. Tbh it’d of been more of a surprise if the execution had been successful.

When you have licensed drugs, properly stored and administered by professionals then it tends to be much more straightforward.

Hardly an ‘achievement’ just to continue existing!

My mum was bedridden and in a care home for over 8 years, before she died at 93. It wasn't all bad, as for most of that time she was compos mentis and actually quite sharp, so she was still able to get pleasure from some things. She did occasionally say though that she wished the health failure that had put her in the home had been fatal.

In her last year she declined severely, and eventually she was mostly asleep, didn't always know what was going on, and was given a month to live. She was moved to a nursing home, where she rallied a bit, but she hated it there. At that point I guess she gave up on life as she basically stopped eating. Well, it's surprising how long a person can live just drinking coffee, with the odd teaspoon of yoghurt or, if the staff could get her to take it, some of a nutritional drink. She lived for 6 months like that, in absolute misery.

I don't know what the answer is there. Towards the end she had NO HOSPITAL ADMISSION on her Respect form, and was only getting painkillers I think. She didn't have a terminal illness for which treatment could have been stopped. So, while at her stage of life I would probably agree with letting illnesses take their course, there was no such illness in my mum's case. Incidentally, a few people I talked to were shocked that the home hadn't put her on a drip feed, to keep her going - but I just said, "What for?"

Over 90, the chances of dementia are one in three. I wish it were only 10%

The last of my elderly relatives died 5yrs ago. Nearly 100, had outlived their numerous siblings, a good number of nieces and nephews, all their friends. The last 10yrs were no fun for anyone, mostly them.
Years ago we got old, ill and shuffled off quickly. Now we get old, ill, and modern medicine patches us up so we can cling on for another 6mths, and then another 6mths and then before you know it you’ve spent a decade chair/bed bound with a miserable quality of life.
When my parents died (cancer) pre Shipman, our family GP came out and gave them drugs that put them to sleep and they were gone in hours. My experience of modern elderly care is that they strive and strive to keep alive regardless of quality of life. They were in far worse state than my parents were, but letting nature take its course no longer seems to be an option however ill you are and how miserable you are. Something needs to change.

My father died in his 60s after a short illness. He was fit and well up until then. I was 17. My mum outlived him by nearly 30 years, dying at 94 with dementia. I’m in my 60s now and certainly don’t feel ready to die yet, but don’t want to end up like my mother either. Surely there is a happy medium.

OP, I totally agree. The insistence on prolonging life, i.e. existence, at all costs (and I don't mean material), is creating suffering for humans that we would never allow for animals, for example.

No. But there should be a range of choices to set limits on medical interventions.

As well as my late DMIL's experience, our family has an aged DF. He's very confused but generally in good health at nearly 94. He is lovingly cared for by his wife at home but susceptible to UTIs which hit hard and usually require a spell in hospital from which (so far) he has returned in filthy clothes and unkempt. But it is exacting a shocking toll on our stepmother, who has her own health issues. If anything were to happen to her....

I am a person who, if I was an mp, you are shaming. My dad died of Lewy bodies dementia, and like this lady lived and recovered from near death multiple times in what can only be described as an obscene disease.

in principle I was supportive, and still am, of assisted dying. But the act was thrown out because it was badly written, with many safe guards being removed and universal condemnation by just about every expert or representative of people potentially in position to request assisted dying that was comsulted. The lobby groups involved in that private members bill were the same as the now infamous VELS with their association with eugenics. Not a good look. It should never have been taken forward as a private members bill .

there also remains a huge question for me on how we will actually kill people. As poster states, and maybe your experience knows, it transpires it is quite hard to kill people if you aren’t prepared to shoot them. Or hang them. Or any other violent catastrophic ending. But that’s too nasty to witness, so we use drugs when you can’t see externally what’s happening to the body. We have all just heard about an appalling failed execution in states, and that’s just the one we’ve heard about. It happens all the time. And boy, USA have years of practice trying to kill people. China do it more successfully by just shooting. We also know there is a lack of any scientifically reliable method from the reported failures in all countries with assisted dyeing. Read up peoples accounts of witnessing their loved ones go through painful, prolonged dying after taking these cocktail of drugs. It’s not in interests of groups like dignatas to voluntarily publish their process outcomes, and no one is gathering Clincial trial type data to find out exactly how to kill people without pain, discomfort and a significant chance of prolonged dying. And failure. Until sufficient data is collected, and assisted dying organisations around the world voluntarily report fully on Clincial outcomes for every assisted death they attempt, I do not believe we should be exposing people to false promises that there’s an “easy” way to die.

the shit reality is that many of the cases the OP describe, have consciously or unconsciously decided to exercise their rights to stop eating largely , known as VSED. It does work, albeit eventually, but arguably more reliably than assisted dying using drugs. my dad did that. It took 11 months. And yes it was a relief, albeit sad, when he died.

So, whilst you may disagree with MPs whose opinions mirror mine, everyone has their own experience and opinions, that may differ form yours, but are equally valid and moral and ethical in their intent. Stop shaming people who reached a different conclusion than you. And rememebr no one on any side of this argument wants to watch people suffer needlessly unless they are a psychopath. Most individuals in HOC and HOL are thankfully not psychopaths are they?

The debate ran its course, hearings were held, the course of law making was followed, the bill was defeated . it will in a few years return I’m sure, hopefully with a much better process of safeguarding that more law makers feel reassured by to pass. If only then we could just figure out how to actually kill people! Personally I’d choose a quick shot to the hesd, but I guess my family would think that’s a bit messy and violent

I'm in London, live in one carer for my parent at home is £7.5 k a month

So does Harold Shipman

I totally agree with all that. And yes, the right-wingers are a terrible threat. Look at the States. And relatives could be a threat, too, as evidenced in this thread.

I’m comforted by remembering that most places that have euthanasia reserve it for the seriously ill. I think in Belgium you can get it for mental health problems, but it is a process.

As far as I’m aware, it’s not available anywhere just because someone is old. The problems with that have been well-demonstrated in this thread. Not least pushy relatives who are tired of the situation. I mean, can you imagine? Yikes! These issues are pretty obvious, so if we did have it, it would probably be limited to those facing terminal illnesses.

Even then, though, people could be subject to pressure from sinister family.

When someone is very old and has advanced dementia, is doubly incontinent, unable to recognise any of their family or hold any sort of conversation, IMO it absolutely IS fine for relatives to judge whether there should be hospital/ABs/drips, etc., to keep them going.

How many people, if asked, would say they would want to be kept going when in that sort of state?

@FashionPassion you are delusional if you think people in this position are happy to keep going, and that the only thing getting them down is the thought that they’re a burden. In general, the people who live to their 90s are those who were always pretty healthy and active, so they feel the pain even more when they can’t do anything for themselves.

These aren’t the Captain Toms of the world. They’re not the jolly feisty 100 year old women we hear about. They’re the frail elderly who can’t do anything for themselves, as their bodies have packed up. All the people in that situation who I’ve met just want it to be over.

When you're doubly incontinent, unable to speak, unable to recognise the children you brought into the world, unable to feed yourself, weigh five stone, lie sleeping all day, and are entirely reliant on a cocktail of drugs and vaccines and spoonfuls of calorie-dense mush being pushed into your mouth to keep the body still ticking over and on this side of mortality...yes, I would judge that life is spent.

But you are correct that no-one else has the 'right' to make this decision. This is why advance directives matter, but people in their 90s now would have had little awareness of such a thing. I do remember the line, 'don't let me go like that' being uttered a lot though, when elderly relatives were suffering their own degrading decline.

@bafta16 Good for them, if they are fit and mentally well. Good luck!

So everyone without mental capacity should be euthanised? Is there an age limit or is this population-wide?

It’s good it’s being discussed.

it’s hard to talk about it with people who have no experience of it.

my neighbour was in her 90s and in bed for the last 3 years. Didn’t really eat at al she was just a skeleton and when she died her daughter was so ‘shocked’ she kept saying how stunned she was and she though she just needed a boost of some vitamins. How the woman was still alive is what I was shocked at. I’m amazed at how long people can stay alive, it’s incredible really.

Your opening post made me think of a conversation I had with mum recently when I asked her about results of blood tests (she has had three trying to find out various information). She just stated that she doesn't actually care about the results. She will be 90 next year. She has pain most of the time now, takes lots of meds, has carers in every morning (not other times though, can manage 'fine') but won't go outside shopping/cafe unless she has to. She has dementia too and I see changes to her behaviour. I live several hundred miles away so see her for chunks of time rather than every day/week. I think she has had enough and frankly, I can see why. What does her future hold? More pain, dementia?

But who do you think should judge?
I think it should be the owner that life. I think I should be able to say now, sane, still working, still capable of planning ahead, 'do not prolong my life when I have lost my dignity and independence. I value those 2 things more than life.'

I agree with you 100%

With regards to the why - follow the money.... big pharma making a fortune keeping the elderly and infirm alive; care homes and care providers making plenty of money too.

Thanks for illustrating my last paragraph so beautifully.

Ps: I have an illness that will leave me bedridden in a home potentially for years. I'm hoping for a heart attack long before then, mostly because I'm a realist and not selfish enough to think that a demented, drooling, doubly incontinent 80 year old me deserves £400,000 funding my care when it can be used to fund education for young people and cancer treatment for 40 year olds.

@HoppityBun there continuing to live the same way that chronically people who are bedbound carry on living.

Being bedbound isn’t an age thing.

And I sure hope you’re not saying that theyd be better dead. Unless you’re also happy to say that to much younger people too. Myself included.