Assisted Dying

[Nordione1]

I dont know what section to put this in. Im more upset about the vote for it than I thought I'd be. I feel like we have crossed a rubicon somehow.

Did you work in end of life care?

Can people really not see the difference between alcohol abuse (a public health issue) and having your life deliberately ended by the state?

Yeah, the first thousands of people die each year and hundreds of thousands are violently attacked and the causes behind it are legal

The other is an unproven hypothesis that hasn't happened and people are using as a reason to want tens of thousands of people to suffer at the end of their life each year against their will by making something illegal because of it

Bizzarre stuff isn't it.

I’m not upset by it. It’s not about ending life, it’s about shortening death.

My Dad passed away at home, after a few months of decline from stage 4 cancer. In his lucid moments he would talk about how he believed in euthanasia and dignity in death.

As long as it’s not abused and used for other purposes other than to make an already terminal person pass away more peacefully and of their own free will then it’s not something to be upset about in my opinion

This was in the context of shaping public policy... perhaps you could have picked a better fitting analogy to challenge my argument.

Except it will surely be expanded to encompass far more than shorter deaths. I hope I'm wrong, but I really don't think I am.

Yes.

You make it sound like the state will choose to kill people. It will be the individual and the individual alone who will make that choice and it is for people who’s quality of life is no longer worth living.

The procedure will be sanctioned by the state. The medical professionals who carry it out ( from those who have the initial discussions, to those who complete the paperwork for consent right through to those who sign the death certificates) will be employed by the state.

It’s an uncomfortable truth for some but honesty and transparency are really important. What is being proposed cannot happen without the state. This is not about individual agency.

We are not "other countries". You are entitled to have your opinion but it would be good if you based your opinion on fact. The Bill does not offer AD to people like you were as a younger person experiencing depression (which btw I am sorry to hear). It is just not credible that 2 doctors and a judge would have found you competent to receive AD. In fact, you were not terminally ill with a prognosis of 6 months or less to live so it would not have possible for you to have accessed AD. You might have "easily considered it". You would not have been granted it.

Of course it's about individual agency.

It won't happen unless the individual actively seeks it out and jumps through multiple hoops.

That was the second reading. I am in agreement with the GP's comments

An individual may start the process themselves. But for the process to reach conclusion, state involvement is required.

If somebody decides to take their own life independently that’s individual agency.

Assisted suicide is not.

Like many, I participate in the culture of HYS but it does encourage and proliferate so many opinions that aren't fact based. Can I please encourage people to actually read the bill section by section so they can be informed before they comment on this thread. It's only 3-4 pages and won't take you long. You can find it online at the HoC website. If the many people who have previously already commented on this thread had done so then many of their comments would have started with the words "I know this isn't included in the bill but I'm concerned of where this may take us as a society in the future....". This would aid people's understanding of what is actually being proposed and not what they've heard 2nd or 3rd hand. As a nation, we suffer a sparsity of fact baed opinion. I blame the tabloids for this but this is just my opinion!

The bill is going to committee where it will get further scrutiny, then if passed by the HoC it will then go to the HoL where the scrutiny starts again

Again, I've read quite a number comments on this thread objecting to the path this bill is taking, "it shouldn't have been introduced as a private members bill". PMB is how we got the 1967 act so there is precedent for taking this route particularly for bills of conscience.

I agree. And what is it going to do to doctors? It's quite a burden to expect them to take on.

I don't think people are saying that is what this act specifically will do. But once the big taboo of the state and doctors being able take life is broken it could end up being extended pretty fast. Especially given the pressures on the NHS.

Looking at Canada and Holland that seems a pretty grim outlook to me.

Live deliberately ended by the state?

What flights of fancy are you entertaining there?

Doctors who don't agree with abortion are allowed to opt out on the basis of conscience. Doctors who don't agree with AD will have an opt out (it is catered for in the Bill). The BMA changed its opposition to AD a few years ago to a neutral stance. Some doctors don't agree that people should have to suffer an agonising death and do believe prolonging people's suffering is doing harm they gave a promise not to do where they swore the hippocratic oath.

Why is this so unpalatable?

The state will produce the legislation, people employed by the state will enact the legislation and the end result will be that people will die because of these actions.

That’s the reality and is something that needs to be considered when people are considering their position on this legislation. The state will be responsible for deaths. If that’s something that people are comfortable with, what’s the issue?

I think they e voted in a world of trouble. Apart from anything else, I thought the courts were massively busy and that every thing was behind? If so they don't need this responsibility on top.

If you have assisted dying, your life is ended.
It's not an accidental death, it's deliberate.
As @ThisAquaCrow points out, the people involved in deliberately ending your life are employed by the state.

Which part of this are you having trouble with?

Many people don't agree with abortion. No one is forced to have one or deal with women having one. The state decided that abortion was legal in certain circumstances. The state is deciding that a person can end their own life with assistance from others. People who are HCPs will opt out if they feel unable to assist just as they do with abortion.
Why is 1 OK, but not the other.

Interestingly however the palliative care doctors that are actually involved in the care of the dying are nearly all against it. There was a statement about it from their association.

If we really wanted to reduce suffering we could

1. Make sure everyone had access to a hospice bed
2. If needed introduce some legislation or guidance around the use of pain relief to ease the dying process at the end of life even if it speeds it up

I imagine that given the pressures around the NHS this legislation will in fact worsen care for the dying even further.

It will end up being, sorry not much more we can do for you. Choices are a) go home and die in agony with a district nurse popping round a couple of times if you are lucky b) take this pill.

My response was to the people who claim that the state is irrelevant when it comes to this legislation. It’s not the case but people seem reluctant to call a spade a spade.

Africa and Godmum. This isn’t aimed at you. We are all entitled to reach our views on this for different reasons. Fine. I am really concerned though by the small amount of evidence in this debate. I’m keen to read what there is and alanthecat offered us all a link to some evidence a few pages back.

As you can see the paper points out, in my paraphrasing that normal level medical evidence gathering that should happen in research and medical practice is not being done on assisted dying, in the countries that already use it. These countries we are holding up as examples to follow. Basic evidence gathering on one of the most serious moral questions of modern life. Err WTF?

The fact this enriched isn’t even being recorded for each death should shock EVERYONE whether they are for or against this issue. Why the fuck is that acceptable? It means that we still don’t actually know what it feels like, or how it actually happens in assisted dying. What other experimental medical procedure is that OK for?

I didn’t even paste in the graphic parts of the paper about what autopsy has revealed about the state of organs like lungs after some assisted dying drugs are used, because of upsetting extrapolating what that might mean for how it actually feels for those people at death. Yet in this debate claims are constantly being made about how assisted dying is essential because it is going to be painless and quick.

Of course I’d want a painless quick death for me and anyone else, I don’t think anyone is ever against reducing pain rather than allowing suffering. But what is being said here in this paper, (and apparently a huge swathe of the population is unwilling to hear it because we all really want the quick pain free version to be true)- is that WE STILL DON’T KNOW what happens in assisted dying or how it feels for the patient. It’s hardly been researched.

That’s well within our gift to have spent some money on as a human race. Surely! Those campaigners pressing for this have sold us a massive uncertainty as fact. It was well acknowledged in Parliament the debate how sparse and poor evidence is around this is.

And I completely understand the need for the idea that there can be comfort and relief from pain, it is incredibly powerful. I want that too. So I would love to be wrong on this. But the answer to uncomfortable questions or evidence is never to say ‘oh but the author doesn’t agree with the idea of it’ and look away. Thats not how scientific and medical discussion works. Who gives a shit what the author personally thinks? This is about a medical procedure. Unless what they’re actually saying is a proven lie, then what are they actually saying? Let’s look at it carefully.

If there’s alternative published evidence disproving that author’s points and showing there’s been lots of research on this, please link to it. It’s a horrible feeling knowing assisted dying is going on and worrying that we don’t actually know what people’s loved ones might be going through.