To think voting for assisted dying legalisation could be a huge mistake???

[MyLimeGuide]

In Scotland they are voting to legalise assisted dying. Looking likely to pass. I am worried this will come to England now. Kier is already proving he doesn't care about old and disabled people so this scares me.
Obviously there are 2 sides but how can people be so ignorant? If passed this could be one of the biggest opportunity for corrupt evil behaviour of saving money on the NHS, care, people literally getting away murder, playing god! No not good. It's so scary.

With the right safeguards this is a good thing. My friend has been diagnosed with motor neurone disease, allowing her to legally be prescribed life ending drugs in the U.K. if she wants this is the humane thing to do, we allow our pets this dignity, she is currently considering going to Switzerland but it would be illegal for her son to even drive her to the airport

I'm all in favour of the bill. 'Palliative care' doesn't take away indignity, loss of self and discomfort. Anyone who's had flu or a heavy cold knows that medicine only goes so far. Pain relief is such a small part of the story.

@ilovesooty I would be interested to hear how people who would like it extended to people who are suicidal envisage it working. Say if someone is taken to A&E after an overdose, what do you think should happen. How would psychiatrists decide whether to offer treatment or to arrange assisted death for the person? It feels like it would fundamentally change the relationship between mh staff and patients.

@Daleksatemyshedits not just that. Look up Huntingtons disease. You die in agony, unable to eat, breathe, swallow. No palliative care makes this better.

Yes, we must mobilise to stop this.

I've typed out a response to this a few times now, and deleted it, because this was clearly a terrible, painful thing that happened to your brother and your family, and arguing on mumsnet is not worth adding to that pain.

I absolutely don't believe that any society should euthanize people solely because they are at risk of suicide already. That could lead to some awful consequences very quickly.

I don't think that's what most proponents of assisted dying want either, and I'm not sure it's what you're arguing for, so I'll leave it there.

no but i was there involved in one way or another with the people who I have talked about.

You said this:

All these poster's relatives who suffered and suffered and died in pain were having good palliative care.

I asked how you knew they all received good palliative care when it's well known to be patchy at best.

My 83 year old father is begging my sister and I, and my partner, to kill him, daily, multiple times a day.

He's in the relatively early stages of dementia, he has just lost his driving licence, the only joy in life is a trundle to the pub once a day for a couple of pints of mild and his dinner.

The rest of the time he is in a lot of pain, he can't sleep well, can't sit comfortably, can't focus on tv or radio or do anything - I would not subject one of our dogs to his current quality of life and it isn't going to get any better.

We've had to ensure we don't leave more than a days medication in his house, as he is now minesweeping the place and necking anything he finds to either get rid of pain or finish himself off.

I know he is TERRIFIED that he will get worse, be able to do less, be unable to express himself. He is baffled and bewildered a lot of the time as his short term memory is utterly fried, and yet is very clear on what he actually wants in the here and now.

You seriously think this is ok for someone to live like this? I damn well won't be letting myself get anywhere near his state - but I have easy access to enough insulin to end things without too much drama or discomfort (or mess).

the end stages of many of the neurological diseases for many people are horrific and not palliated by palliative care. In most cases the sufferer retains full competence and is aware of what is happening and what will happen.

I think some people on this thread think all that is needed is ‘good palliative care’ for everyone to die comfortably surrounded by rainbows and unicorns. Those of us who have watched loved ones die, slowly and painfully despite this ‘good care’ are a bit more realistic.

This.

With luck my dicky heart will ensure a quick death for me before any of my other things (mostly neurological) kill me. If I get to a certain level of incompetence in certain areas I want to end it. Please let me. I have little enough quality of life as it is.

The thinking I see on this thread is very ideological. We are told the state will provide palliative care and everyone should be happy with it.

The state knows best. The state needs to protect all and one from dangers that are only in the mind of some posters.

There is no place for individual wishes according to them.

Safeguarding at all costs is their battle cry. All they want is for the state to control everything, ostensibly in everyone’s best interests. They don’t trust themselves to make a decision, they need the state to prescribe it to them.

They have no empathy. All they have is self-righteousness.

Yet you want the state to assist in suicide.

I want to be able to make a free decision.

You can make a decision to end your life. You can make a decision not to receive treatment. You can make a decision not to be ressussitated. You don't need the state's permission.

Are you deliberately pretending you don’t understand, or are you always like this?

Does someone having a different opinion to you mean they don't understand? Seems very arrogant.

@MiloMinderbinder925except you can’t. I heard a case of a 95 year old being tried for murder for killing his terminally ill wife, also in her nineties. A capacity assessment, advance directive and assisted dying would have prevented that man spending his last few years in prison.

You can't what?

I truly think this could be a matter of individual case by case in many active EOL scenarios, like my mother, who died roughly 36 hours after being catheterised and given a syringe driver, having spent the last week phasing in and out and having expressed a desire to die several times whem her legs started leaking fluid and nothing more could be done. A week of that and hallucinations could have been prevented with proper conversation with medics about giving a couple of doses of pain meds that would likely have been fatal far quicker than the " we have to careful not to overdose on morphine via the syringe driver" scenario etc.

From my perspective and experience if someone is going to die ANYWAY the tinkering around with drugs etc on the last stages is the bureaucratic equivalent of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

People are currently being denied autonomy and dignified death with capacity, or without, even in their last days or hours, due to bureaucracy. The proposed Assisted Dying Bill, needing the safeguards it does due to being legislation, will possibly help very few terminally ill people because of the required safeguards. The people wanting assisted dying should have it in such circumstances, IMO. But, I don't trust government nor legislation in many cases. As others have pointed out, the bureaucracy may mean many applying for it will die beforehand anyway.

When my DP had his second brain bleed, and I was told he wasn't going to recover, I sat by his bed side listening to agonal breathing, and knowing he'd been gone for several days. Life support was withdrawn as a medical decision for comfort and dignity, I had no say in it other than the remote prospect of him coming back as a vegetable would have been against his wishes. Still I had close friends of his praying for a miracle, and urging me to "not give up". A swift upping of narcotics would have spared me three fucking days of watching him die.

I don't think we need an Assisted Dying Bill, I think we need something along the lines of death management. And maybe a comprehensive "access to suitable drugs" pathway for those with six months to live without so many of the hoops, like any treatment discussion with your primary HCP.

Why dies there always have to be a law, or legislation, leading to the inevitable to and fro of lawyers etc ? And the likelihood of misuse through pure tortology?

Like abortion, it should be between the sufferer and their HCPs IMHO.

I've thought about it alot.

Sorry not RTFT but my understanding was that you had to be terminally ill with only 6 months left to live and that you had to be compos mentis to be able to make the decision. Two doctors have to give consent. This if for England not sure if it's different in Scotland

What if you are paralysed and can’t make the decision to independently end your own life? I remember when Dianne Pretty took her case to the European courts over the right to be assisted in her death. MND is a brutal disease and she didn’t want to drown in her own saliva and instead wanted a death at a time and manner of her choosing.

I don’t understand why people who are dying, who want to die, should be forced to endure a few months of suffering for some sort of perceived greater good.

Instead they should refuse treatment to bring about their end? What does that look like in practice, withdrawing fluids/ food so they starve? Waiting for an infection to worsen?

I watched my beautiful best friend die in pain and fear at 35 from a brain tumour.

"already proving he doesn't care about old and disabled people so this scares me."

No, you are.