Assisted dying

[LovelyBath77]

Please don't read if this upset you, but I think that it should be up to us when we choose to die, especially with an illness which isn;t going to get better. I don't want to have long term care and give all that money to it which could be left to my children, and definitely don't want to be in a position where you have no choice and considered incapable of making decisions.

I think there needs to be some change on this. AIBU?

The thing is, with psychiatric care they can say "nothing more to be done" in a way that's harder to argue with. We need to change society, not kill people and pretend it's to relieve their suffering that is causd by this inhumane world!

It's what people want though, isn't it? They'd rather people who have suffered and need love and care were just shut out.

As a previous poster has already said, if you browbeat and harangued your ill grandmother now within the limits of existing legislation now to hoard her pills and then overdose on them so that you could inherit her estate, and she did so, you would either:

a) get away with it and her death would be reported as suicide
b) get caught and prosecuted for murder/attempted murder depending on whether she died or not

If, under assisted dying legislation, you browbeat and harangued your ill grandmother to request a lethal dose of medication so that you could inherit her estate, and she did so, you would either:

a) get away with it and her death would be reported as assisted suicide
b) get caught and prosecuted for murder/attempted murder

Except in the latter case your grandmother would have far more intervention to ensure that she was doing this of her own free will - surely safer than at present?

Do elderly disabled people end their lives due to the pressures put on them by their families? Have there been any cases reported?

I am disabled and already feel like a burden on my family. If euthanasia was allowed for people like me, I would feel duty bound to do it.

If the government thinks my disability is so bad that it's ok to be helped to die, then I'm probably being unfair in not doing so.

You can say that you can put safeguards in place to prevent this, but I shall just lie and blame my wish to die on something else, in order to obtain euthanasia. I'll be doing it though, because if the option is there, I feel I should.

Doesn't the need for euthanasia reflect terrible palliative care. Perhaps if we worked on that, people wouldn't need to feel like euthanasia was the better option.

No I don't think that's true. I've seen a close family member die from cancer and by the end she had absolutely no quality of life and was in pain- despite extremely good care. She had every drug and treatment available but she was suffering. By the end, if im honest I wanted her to die because I loved her and because she was suffering. It wasnt about not giving her love and care, it was the exact opposite.

Bbc nobody wants to shut anybody out nobody wants to kill off people in the guise of putting out of their misery, however people want the right to live or die how they choose

That was in reply to BBCnewsrave

Palliative care cannot help with everything. There is still a lot of suffering.

If you really think your relatives see you as a burden and would rather not have you around - it is your relatives that are the problem, not the system.

The anti choicers justify suffering by saying 'hard cases make bad law'. Religion makes bad laws.

The thing is, with psychiatric care they can say "nothing more to be done" in a way that's harder to argue with. We need to change society, not kill people and pretend it's to relieve their suffering that is causd by this inhumane world!
It's what people want though, isn't it? They'd rather people who have suffered and need love and care were just shut out.

I know you are clearly in a bad place, but that is just unfair and untrue. If someone is dying horribly with (eg) cancer and their pain cannot be eased, why should they not choose to end their own suffering? Do you honestly think that because I would rather that a loved one had the right to end their own suffering, that I just want to get rid of them?!

I agree we could have better palliative care. That would be helpful. It can give perspective to have had something severe and chronic and I've seen people dying or slowly being kept alive in hospital and it can seem like prolonging the agony at times.

My prescriptions are three monthly and it would be easy to built up a 'suicide kit' as Henry Marsh terms it so well in the recent article he has done (brain surgeon who is very frank after treating many end of life brain cancer patients).

I remember feeling nothing but relief when my lovely GM died of a heart attack after dementia obliterated everything she was in life, it's a sad state of affairs when you feel relief at someone's death.

Grommit though, on the whole, you have the right of it

Doesn't the need for euthanasia reflect terrible palliative care.
yes.

I feel I'd like this choice but then I'm not currently in the position of feeling as though I'm a burden so I'm not best placed to speak about the impact, I can see this happening too and it wouldn't be right.

BMW Absolutely no-one has suggested or even hinted that anyone should be euthanized because they are any kind of burden.

But it's all in the context. People with "psychiatric" (often life having dealt a shit hand and no-one cares to help them heal) problems already have been euthanised. If we lived in a society where people were loved and cared for, if we valued caring work rather than just making money, it would be different. But we don't live in that world, we live here, where people are neglected and made to feel a burden.

I previously bleakly joked that NHS mental health care should just be a lethal injection, as that would be preferable. In a low point I wrote a poem that concluded with the idea that they should just kill us rather than being social outcasts - it seemed more honest. It sends shivers down my spine to know that could become reality. And I was told I was "untreatable" over a decade ago... I'm sure a psych or several would have been willing to sign the form.

It's difficult to put into words but it seems like a disturbing extent of neoliberalism. All choicy-choicy obscuring the disturbing truths of individualism. We live in a society that would abuse euthaniasia.

Of course we don't want anyone to be in pain at the end, but it is just not as clear cut as that.

Special subject - my family have NEVER said I'm a burden and would be devastated if they knew I felt like this. My family do not create my feelings of being a burden, being a burden does that. So my relatives are not "the problem" as you so awfully put it. I would tell you to fuck off for that awful comment, but I don't want to get banned so I won't.

What sort of palliative care would make life worth living for potentially another 20-30 years if you were totally paralysed, in pain and perhaps blind due to a disease like MS? Debbie Purdy had to starve herself to death as there was no other way of killing herself without assistance which must have been horrific.

BBC NewsRave - I 100% agree, and I'm an ex MH nurse.

The contempt which many in supposed caring professions have for people with MH difficulties means that forms would be signed with no problem, especially for certain patients who the staff view as a problem. That contempt, was one of the reasons I left. Those attitudes are endemic within MH services, even amongst newly qualified nurses and psychiatrists.

It is understandable that people are quick to want their family members to avoid suffering, and in those cases, euthanasia would be the kindest thing, yet those same people are blinkered to the fact that providing that option for those in great pain, will end up in those who could be helped, also being dead.

I actually know a Dr on the Euthanasia ethics panel for the BMA. He went into that being fiercely pro-euthanasia, because of seeing people die in agony. He is now fiercely against it, because it will result in other people dying who could have been helped.

But BBC your absolute right to life should not stop me choosing to end mine if it became a burden to ME! Of course you should live as long as you can and choose to, but if I became terminally ill and am in pain and distress, I May want to die quickly and painlessly for my own sake, nothing to do with the convenience of anyone else!

Your rights to live must be protected, but surely I can have a say over my own life and death too?

Roomster - for starters, more research on adequate pain relief is needed. If people are in pain, they are quite simply not being prescribed enough medication. Sometimes, so much medication may be needed that death could be a side effect. This is how doctors currently handle euthanasia, and how my FIL was helped out of this world when he was in agony due to cancer.

In some countries, patients are allowed to be sedated into a coma so that they can't experience pain and are completely unaware during their last days. Why can this not happen here? It would require a law change, but it could be done. There are ways of solving the issues without killing people.

Regulations could be in place to prevent assisted dying for those with psychiatric illness though.

Roomster - people with psychiatric problems get other illnesses too. I have both. I could easily say I wanted to die because of my disability, when in fact it was due to the despression on being a burden. How exactly would you safeguard that?

Roomster - for starters, more research on adequate pain relief is needed. If people are in pain, they are quite simply not being prescribed enough medication. Sometimes, so much medication may be needed that death could be a side effect. This is how doctors currently handle euthanasia, and how my FIL was helped out of this world when he was in agony due to cancer.

Pain is not the main problem for some people though. It may be more the fact that they are paralysed, blind and may remain that way for 20 to 30 years.

I'm sorry about you're losses, , endoftheline,
I absolutely believe assisted suicide has to be a legal option.

Pain is a big problem. Even modern painkillers can't help with everything.

This seems a brilliant idea that would at least help some people though Grommit:

In some countries, patients are allowed to be sedated into a coma so that they can't experience pain and are completely unaware during their last days

I don't think it's religion holding back this law change, it's the complexity and unintended signals - you can see that just from what's on this thread so far.

I used to be completely in favour of euthanasia but over the last couple of years I've changed my mind. I just see so much potential for abuse. As well as what other posters have pointed out - those who might do it out of a sense of obligation because they feel they are a burden. I just think it's too risky. I don't know the answer. Maybe it could be permitted in certain situations, done on a case by case basis.

Roomster - people with psychiatric problems get other illnesses too. I have both. I could easily say I wanted to die because of my disability, when in fact it was due to the despression on being a burden. How exactly would you safeguard that?

If people with documented psychiatric problems were ineligible for assisted dying then it wouldn't matter what reason they gave for wanting assisted dying.

Maybe it could be permitted in certain situations, done on a case by case basis.

I think that is the answer and is all people are asking for. If there was any uncertainty then it should be refused.