Esther Rantzen "too frail" to travel to Switzerland (Dignitas)

[ItWasnaMeGuv]

Hopefully a family member of friend will take her and she can get her wish.

I'm not against AS but I am against there being a lack of safeguarding which is a massive issue with the current bill. Better to write the bill with the safeguarding in it than pass it and then amend.

These are the suggested amendments which were refused by the Committee

Having watched my granny suffer, I am desperately hoping this passes. She was asking if I could take her to dignitas at the end, but by then she was so ill that it would have been extremely difficult to get her there, and we wouldn't have wanted to be at risk of being charged with assisting suicide.

I also saw my grandad suffer terribly but he wouldn't be eligible under this legislation.

I think the key thing to remember is that the individual has to consent, and there would need to be very careful regulations to make sure that those individuals were certain in their decision and that they were making it without coercion.

I also think there's no way it's morally clear cut that the right thing to do is leave people suffering instead of allowing them to end their lives. The latter has the risk of coercion, and the former involves individuals suffering unnecessarily.

I’m horrified by the situation in the Netherlands. Someone with advanced dementia can’t consent to assisted dying.

Maybe so, but since we don't have the former I think it is irresponsible to jump straight to the latter, though I can see why it's appealing since it is by far the cheaper and easier option. Also, as exhibited by many posters on this thread, people are already clamouring for the putative law to be extended beyond its current remit before it has even passed. This is not very reassuring to those of us who were told to stop objecting because it would only apply to those with under six months to live! If we're already sliding down the slippery slope before the bill has been signed off then my fears about what this could mean for those of us who are sick and disabled seem very well justified.

Who decides whether someone like that gets assisted dying though? The relatives that don't want to visit her any more? If she can't make her own decisions any more it can't be her. But after which minor stroke? The first? The third?

And what about the over reach that's been happening in the Netherlands and Canada? Can those with mental illness ask to die, when we know that with proper treatment people can have a full life? Some people with autism have asked to die - what about them?

It is.

I hope she is comfortable and has good support.

She is rich, she can afford a private air ambulance there. No such thing as too frail to travel unless you’re poor.

Yes, but consent should be given before a person loses capacity. The key is CHOICE and decisions should be made while someone has mental capacity.

I think oponents of AD seem to think that the bill is about making AD compulsory but it's not, it's about choice.

If the person with dementia withdraws their consent, this is disregarded in NL. The death can be carried out on someone objecting to it, if they consented when they were of sound mind.

I don't think you understand the law. Anyone helping her get to Dignitas would be committing a criminal offence as the law stands in the UK. Even if she were paying them in their professional capacity.

It is, therefore, depressingly easy to envisage a future in which, if the law is changed, the 'right to die' will come to encompass those who are not terminally ill and where it could come to be seen as a compassionate, and conveniently cost-effective way, of 'helping' disabled people, both by government and, I am afraid, by the occasional family.

Yes, surveys of applicants expressing their reason for applying for MAID showed a worrying trend that was summed up by the researchers as the right to die becomes a duty to die. This was based on the high % of applicants where their primary reason was expressed as ‘don’t want to be a burden’ rather than ‘suffering so much I want to die’

Rubbish. They don’t prosecute the airlines, so they wouldn’t prosecute an air ambulance company.

I think it might be that they've voted to vote on it (?!) but we should see an outcome in the next half hour or so.

Chartering a private air ambulance is not the same as booking a seat on a scheduled flight.

It’s not much different and besides the law prosecutes individuals, not corporations or their employees doing their usual work. They’d be charged with keeping her alive while travelling so really batshit to say they’d he helping her die.

Looks like it hasn't passed. It will be interesting to see who has changed their mind since the last bill. I guess the positive about this is it means there's now no loss in redrafting the bill (because before, if it wasn't identical, the lord's could essentially time it out again). So hopefully some of the extra safeguards can be written into it, if it comes back again.

I think with things like this, it often takes a while for law making to catch up with look opinion. 75% of people are in favour of some sort of assisted dying.

https://www.opinium.com/resource-center/will-public-opinion-translate-into-legislative-change/

Amazingly the headline got it wrong. A correction has been issued. It didn’t pass.

Sorry what overreach?

Mentally ill people in the Netherlands have to have tried every available therapy, more than 90% of requests are not granted.

It's not granted on a whim.

I'm relieved it's not passed.
It's not gloating, it is relief. Sheer relief.

I'm sorry but anybody who thought this would only apply to those in agony are being naive and lacking in imagination - at least about this. That's an understatement.

They need to improve palliative care not effectively give the state a legalised way of killing people.

Thank goodness it's over, for now at least.

I hope she dies peacefully & painlessly with her family around her. That's always seemed the best option to me.

They need to improve palliative care

Except they won't. No dignity in dying in Britain.

I too am relieved it's been rejected (and I support assisted dying after seeing the painful death of someone close to me with cancer).
The reason I didn't support this bill is because
1- palliative care is so underfunded & many people can't access it- it needs better funding if people are to have a genuine choice
2- the safeguarding of the proposed bill was poor as per @HobnobsChoice above. (I am particularly concerned about elder abuse and abused women experiencing coercion from family members).
It's a pity the Leadbetter Committee rejected all the safeguarding amendments.

A friend of mine consented to putting his 97 year old mum on the Liverpool pathway. Took her 3 days to die and he had to sit and watch it.

I don't think you understand the law. Anyone helping her get to Dignitas would be committing a criminal offence as the law stands in the UK. Even if she were paying them in their professional capacity.

@Fast800goingforit Even though it is a criminal offence, nobody has been arrested for assisting someone to dignitas.