Self-confessed GP killer struck off

[Chil1234]

Unlike Harold Shipman, Dr Howard Martin was acquitted of murder but has been struck off the medical register for deliberately speeding up the deaths of terminally ill patients.

This case shows how fine the acceptable line is between alleviating suffering through palliative care and deliberately hastening death. It highlights how easy it is for one man's 'mercy killing' to prove to be plain old-fashioned 'killing'

I'm not a supporter of euthanasia as a principle. But even if I was, I think this case would throw up a lot of awkward questions.

tbh I have mixed views on this.

While obviously hastening the deaths of patients in your care without their consent is wrong, I'm not sure that it can be argued that it is wrong to feel that someone who is suffering unbearable pain/indignity should perhaps be relieved from that, if the outcome is that they are going to die iminently anyway.

There is imo a difference between helping someone to die who is terminally ill and going to die a long, drawn-out death, and killing someone because you think they would be better off dead, i.e. due to serious disability.

In the former people are not saying that the patient is better off dead, the reality is the patient is going to die, is it really better to make that patient go through all the pain they can go through than to help them die more peacefully? Is any family member really ready to watch their relative die? Some might be, but could a family member be objective about the amount of pain their relative was in at the time of death if they found out that death had happened hours before it would have happened naturally anyway?

I wouldn't want to die a drawnout death. And the statement that you wouldn't let a dog die like that does carry some truth imho.

I, like expat, think that there is a place in society for legalized and regulated euthanasia.

I think this dr was misguided yes, but that he did IMO have good intentions. These people were going to die. And they were going to die soon. You can't compare it with shipman who killed off people who weren't terminally ill and who possibly had years of life ahead of them.

I told you that was my opinion, Riven, for myself.

I was not born disabled.

If I develop a disease like dementia, I do not want to live anymore.

I think I, and all those adults of sound mind, should have complete domain over their own bodies, from reproductive choices to assisted suicide.

I find it a slippery slope that others or the government should dictate to me whether or not my life is 'worth' living. I decide that as it is my life.

This is why I support documents like Living Wills and assisted suicide.

Again, I'm talking about adults of sound mind.

Some adults may find their life is worth living in a situation where others would find it unconscionable. IMO, one is not more correct than the other because one's life belongs to the individual.