Why are more females than males euthanised?

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..in The Netherlands that is.
Just a quick glance at some research shows that 70% of people euthanised due to psychiatric disorders are female.

Any thoughts as to why this might be? Standard of care?
Just seems a shocking difference.

How many in total are euthanised for psychiatric disorders?

They euth peoe for psychiatric disorders?? That cant be right

This is the results of some research done. The data is for between 2011-2014.

70% (46 of 66) of patients were women, 32% were over 70 years-old, 44% were between 50–70, and 24% were 30–50. Most had chronic, severe conditions, with histories of attempted suicides and psychiatric hospitalizations. A majority had personality disorders and were described as socially isolated or lonely. Depressive disorders were the primary issue in 55% of cases. Other conditions represented were psychotic, PTSD/anxiety, somatoform, neurocognitive, and eating disorders, as well as prolonged grief and autism. Co-morbidities with functional impairments were common. A minority (41%) of physicians performing euthanasia/assisted suicide were psychiatrists. 18 (27%) patients received the procedure from physicians new to them, 15 (23%) of whom were physicians from the End-of-Life Clinic, a mobile euthanasia clinic. Consultation with other physicians was extensive, but 11% of cases had no independent psychiatric input and 24% of cases involved disagreement among consultants. The Review Committee found one case to have failed to meet legal due care criteria

They euth peoe for psychiatric disorders?? That cant be right

Sadly they do. A male friend of mine did this a couple of years ago.

Hmm... seems very easy to do
Here's one about a 20 something young woman with her life ahead of her

I think more women are diagnosed with mental health problems?

The Netherlands is one of the few countries where euthanasia is allowed to allow people with psychiatric diagnoses (rather than physical illness) to request to die.

There’s been a recent article on the bbc news website about a 29 year old woman who was helped to die earlier this year. I found it very sad and shocking but I wondered if I was hypocritical as on balance I believe people should have a choice about ending their own life. It seemed so sad she couldn’t be helped.

I don’t know the answer OP but read the case of Aurelia this morning and found it incredibly disturbing www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-45117163

32% were over 70 years-old

Could it be as simple as the population of women being greater, so there are more asking to be euthanised?

According to this, at 70 men/women are fairly even, but by 80, there are 2 women to everyone man in the Netherlands

Women are more prone to psychiatric disorders, I believe, so the difference could just be reflective of the incidence in the population. Also, men are more likely to kill themselves, so maybe more of them do that rather than resort to requesting euthanasia.

I find this very disturbing. I’m somehow more comfortable with people with terminal physical illnessness ending their lives and I’m finding it hard to express exactly why. I need to think about this. That’s a big skew in the sex ratio.

Beligium has laws which allow minors to end their lives, and they have been used on children as young as 9. That I find wrong.

Probably women are more open about how they're feeling and admitting they have issues, going to doctors etc.

I agree with this being an option. People with mental health issues kill themselves all the time, this takes away the option of having to choose a painful method.

Beligium has laws which allow minors to end their lives, and they have been used on children as young as 9

fucking hell

every day's a school day on MN

I hope it’s something as simple as that FruitOnAPlatter.
It was that case reggie and my friend that made me have a google of the stats.

depression is almost always reported to be twice as
common in women compared with men across diverse societies and social contexts

www.who.int/mental_health/media/en/242.pdf

Of course, that's reported depression. But it seems unlikely it can all be explained by under-reporting.

Children with terminal illnesses can ask for euthanasia in Belgium under very strict conditions. Don't go there with the "bloody hell".

I would imagine that the tradition of women being care givers and not having care givers accounts for some of it.

I still find it concerning princessmargaret - I know the criteria are ‘unbearable suffering’.

What worries me is who defines unbearable and what the checks and balances are in relation to it. For context, we are seeing minors in the USA able to access puberty blockers and cross sex hormones which will render them permanently sterile and with serious long term side effects simply with self declaration from places like planned parenthood - the prescribers are not even required to be qualified physicians.

In that light - even if we agree that children should be able to control their lives and their endings which in some cases I think they should - we need to be very, very careful about the frameworks which surround such mechanisms.

I am dutch and one of my friends has ptsd and depression and a physical disorder that givers her a lot of pain (she needs high doses of morfine to cope). She is a woman in her forties. She has been begging for euthanasia for three years. The doctors still think that they can help her and make her life better so they won't sign it. One of the rules is that there has to be suffering without a future of getting better (like terminal cancer).

It's not that easy to get euthanasia. I also think that everyone owns their own life and that if they refuse to die suffering then they should get that peaceful death.

I think for me it’s not so much that the option is there. No one should be forced to die in pain and with no dignity.

What I worry about is the framework around it. How do we make sure that it’s not abused? How do we make sure it’s the patients consented wish? These are difficult questions ethically.

It’s a very small amount of people too, not enough to make the sample statistically recognisable as an issue. Plus previously mentioned higher occurance and recognition of MH issues in women

Yeah. Being totally anti-euthanasia, I'm not even slightly surprised by this.
I'm always boggled by the inconsistencies. We section people in this country for persistent suicidal ideation. And here we are discussing legally assisting them to commit suicide.

It is Pandora's box, and there is, quite simply, no way of getting all the bad stuff back in the box. The only thing that will happen is a shift in definition so that the bad stuff is no longer called bad stuff.

It will happen in this thread.

Perhaps it is because men who attempt suicide are more likely to be ‘successful’.
That poor young woman who was on the BBC website had attempted suicide many times but had failed.

Perhaps it is because men who attempt suicide are more likely to be ‘successful’
That poor young woman who was on the BBC website had attempted suicide many times but had failed

Know I need to find out why female suicide attempts fail more often than men’s. It’s pretty easy to kill yourself if you really want to, I can’t imagine it’s just because women are shit at it.

Men on average choose more physical and violent methods - shooting, jumping, hanging, walking in front of trains etc. Women on average choose methods like paracetamol overdoses and poisoning. These are more likely to be caught in time.

There's so many possibilities

Women live longer
Men commit suicide themselves much more

Then there is stuff like lots of women living with conditions that are not diagnosed or treated properly -
We are undertreated for pain
We are misdiagnosed with mental health issues when we have a physical problem
We are fobbed off and encouraged to "get on with it" when we have a physical problem
Lots of things that go on with us are under studied / not well understood due to focus on men for so long

There was a story a while ago from the netherlands (not sure if this is the same person) where a young woman was enthanised - she had terrible mental health problems. She had been horribly sexually abused as a child which is where her issues stemmed from. However she was very ill, felt there was no way forward and opted out. That sort of thing it feels to me like - what happened to the man or men who abused her? A lot of mental health problems are reactive - they are due to genuinely awful / difficult / intolerable situations now or in the past. Is there any focus on prevention? To changing and improving society? This feels like an easy out for society. Victims of abuse are difficult - they have stories that are uncomfortable to hear. They ask for people to be held to account that maybe society doesn't want to hold to account. They make groups feel collective guilt. If they are dead, their voices stop.