Posted on 05/03/2018 11:53:14 AM PDT by Morgana
This is the second in a five-part series contrasting the ways our society could handle end-of-life care moving forward.
The right to die is an odd concept. Everyone will inevitably die. Many people fear what sort of condition they may be when they are older or suffering from a terminal disease. Some people express that fear in these exact words: “I don’t want to be hooked up to all of those machines.”
Patients certainly have a right to refuse unwanted medical treatment. But when people speak of the “right to die,” they don’t mean allowing someone at the end of life to let life take its natural course. People have had that right for a long time, even before the advent of modern palliative care and adequate pain control. No, the “right to die” means euthanasia or suicide: the right to kill a suffering person or to kill oneself.
Autonomy is given as the reason we need to have a “right to die,” but embracing a “right to die” quickly ends with sacrificing patient autonomy. “I don’t want to be hooked up to all of those machines” turns into, “You shouldn’t be hooked up to all of those machines.”
It’s a slippery slope. Some accuse people who refuse to embrace euthanasia of committing a logical fallacy by saying it’s a slippery slope. It’s not a fallacy, however, and real world experience backs up the simple observation that people will often take the easy way out instead of the right way through a problem.
The Alfie Evans case is a prime example. Courts in Britain thought that death was preferable to Alfie living, despite his loving parents’ decision to let his life continue with palliative care. The court ordered he must die now, because of his “quality of life.”
Alfie’s autonomy, as expressed and protected by his parents? Ruled irrelevant, not in his best interest, in the opinion of a judge who never has to visit Alfie’s grave.
In countries that have embraced a legalized “right to die,” a “duty to die” is quickly taking hold. In the Netherlands and Belgium, involuntary euthanasia—we call that “murder” here—is a significant proportion of euthanasia deaths. Efforts to prosecute doctors who decide to kill their patients—for their own good they say—fail. The autonomy of patients who want to live but are killed anyway? Unprotected, of little value.
Here in Michigan, we know of cases where patients who request medical treatments have them denied in secret and have secret orders placed into their charts, because the doctors believe the patient is better off dead. Imagine the horror of learning a hospital has placed a do-not-resuscitate order in your file, even though you expressed your wishes for life-saving care. What can you do when your life depends on those who think you need to die? The autonomy of those with the will to live? Not just ignored, but undermined in secret.
As we pointed out in part one, what happens when health insurance costs combine with a “right to die”? Patients find themselves being encouraged to exercise their cheaper “right to die” than their right to life. The autonomy to choose your own medical care? Rejected, some rights are apparently better than others (and cheaper).
A society that protects patient autonomy and gives them the compassionate care they deserve simply cannot be a society that embraces suicide or killing as a solution for the sick and disabled. They don’t go together, today or in the future. Caring for the sick and disabled can be hard and places demands on the healthy and able. It’s cheap and easy to lethally inject someone or give them a lethal dose of drugs. The “right to die” gives moral window-dressing to taking the easy road at the expense of the good road.
Patients deserve protection, from food and water to the right to refuse unwanted medical treatment. Killing patients isn’t a right, however, it’s wrong.
They say “right to die”.
They mean “obligation to die”.
If someone wants to die, it’s their right but don’t involve the rest of us. Someone with terminal illness who doesn’t want to be hooked up to machines should suicide themselves before they have to drag in others to do it for them. Bringing in others is murder. Bringing in Dr. Kevorkian types is still murder.
That elderly couple who did this on yesterday’s thread could just as easily quietly closed the garage and turned on the car. All their great love story and celebrating death over a lobster dinner with their family and friends is disgusting. Poor lobsters. Like last meals for prisoners. What the heck. Don’t go out and kill an animal since it’s going to waste. Just throw the switch and get it over with.
Wow...I actually work in Health Care...I happen to be a DNR..but that doesn't mean..I'm going to "do" myself..if I have a terminal illness...What kind of person are you?
And in my experience...we don't kill people who have a terminal diagnosis....Terminal...can be 2-4 years..!! ALS...CA..can last for many years.
I find your comments disgusting..frankly.
Ultimately, only Almighty God has the power to give, or to take life.
All God’s creatures, and especially their “representatives” in Government tacitly approve of a blasphemous disrespect of God’s will...
Christie eleison. Kyrie eleison!
It's more than that. Just as the "right to choice" includes the right to compel others to pay for abortion and to compel others to actively participate in that abortion, the "right to die" would extend as an exact parallel to euthanasia. The minimum acceptable level of care for insurance, whether under Obamacare or under the next dreadful FedGov intrusion on our decisions, will include "right to die" coverage if normal people lose this battle.
Here is a for instance. My dad died in 1979 of his fourth heart attack. Around 1971 after his first heart attack he went to visit Dr. Denton Cooley in Houston to see if he could help him. Dr. Denton Cooley was famous for doing the first heart transplant. Dr. Cooley told dad he was to far gone for bypass and he wasn't even fifty yet. Nowadays of course, some ninety year old men have quadruple bypass surgery.
I say keep me plugged in for as long as it takes for medicine to catch up to my condition or ailment. Some dreams are better than drugs anyway. I don't mind tripping into eternity. The power of the human mind is God's greatest creation.
Indeed.
Perhaps you could re-read my post. I never said the health workers should kill people.
I oppose all suicides period. If someone gives you a lethal injection by your request that is suicide.
Why does society have the right to tell suffering individuals they have to suffer more? I do not want to die but I understand why some people want this option. I a wife die of a heart attack trying to care for her husband. I’ve seen medical facilities use people with loss of mental understanding for medical studies. I’ve experienced daily pain, and the effects of opioids. I now take a non opioid pain killer. I do not ever want to use them again. I’ve watched families abandon the mentally ill. I can not say it should be illegal. But l highly discourage it.
Someone with terminal illness who doesn’t want to be hooked up to machines should suicide themselves before they have to drag in others to do it for them.
I found that statement...cruel and pretty much wrong.
Life is the most basic right, which is why progressives are so opposed to it.
The topic is about Right to Die. Wanting to kill themselves. To commit suicide. Do I seriously have to make the point of specifically typing out “those with terminal illness WHO WISH TO USE THEIR RIGHT TO DIE, blah, blah, blah. Geez, you’re the only one who can’t seem to grasp this simple concept in context to the topic at hand.
You don't have to yell.
I'm pretty sure I grasp many complex concepts....
And I am still actively engaged in life and dead decisions ...in hospital settings.
I have some experience....
You can tell me where I'm wrong........
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