Posted on 04/19/2009 10:00:27 AM PDT by wagglebee
When someone with a terminal illness decides to end their life by overdosing on barbiturates, they hope the drugs will lull them into a peaceful and permanent sleep. But if the drugs have passed their expiration date or lack a sufficiently lethal concentration, the would-be suicide victim may actually survive - risking an array of complications including coma, reduced physical functioning and the opprobrium of disapproving friends and family. Now, in an effort to provide certainty to those contemplating suicide, one of the world's leading euthanasia advocates plans to sell barbiturate testing kits to confirm that deadly drug cocktails are, in fact, deadly.
"People who are seriously ill don't want to experiment," says Dr. Philip Nitschke, the physician known as 'Dr. Death' for his efforts to legalize euthanasia in his native Australia. "They want to know they have the right concentration of drugs so that if they take them in the suggested way it will provide them with a peaceful death."
The kits, which will debut in Britain in May and retail for $50, include a syringe that allows users to extract half a milliliter of barbiturate solution without breaking the sanitary seal. "Clearly sterility doesn't matter given that death is the desired outcome," Nitschke says. But the solution deteriorates slower in a sterile environment, allowing those with painful conditions to "lock it away in the back of the cupboard in case things gets too bad." The extracted sample is then mixed with chemicals from the kit; a color change indicates a lethal solution.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I see. You believe that it is ok to take someone else's life but not to take one's own life.
I have NEVER associated your father with ANYTHING. In fact, I have no clue what you are referring to.
Ah, you are part of the culture of death?
I have been there with my Mother and Father and
Absolutely know how difficult it is
But under no circumstances would I call upon anyone
to have positively caused their death
Yes, society has believed this for thousands of years.
Yes you have. My father advocated being able to obtain the appropriate drugs so to end his life peacefully. That makes him part of your culture of death. I guess you also put me in that same category.
I understand that you grieve the loss of your father, but you also need to understand that nearly all of us will eventually face the painful death of a loved one.
Society believed that slavery was right for thousands of years. In fact it is in the bible.
Take you 'understanding' back. You do NOT understand so quit pretending that you do.
If you want to oppose capital punishment, that is fine with me. I believe that it has probably lost its effectiveness as a deterrent.
That's not the issue. The issue is whether you want laws to remove options on how to end their lives. If (hypothetically speaking) they wanted to end their lives by taking drugs, would you deny them that option?
You ARE NOT the only person who has lost loved ones, this is part of life and it ALWAYS will be.
Your posts on this thread are way off base.
You have my deepest sympathies on the loss of your father. However, as I have NO CLUE who your father is, my opposition to euthanasia (which I have been opposing on FR for years) has NOTHING to do with you or your father.
I never said I opposed CP. I was pointing out that your position is not consistent in that you advocate killing others with drugs but want to keep laws to prevent a person from ending his own life in the manner he chooses.
Capital punishment is a collective right of the state, it has NEVER been an individual right and it is a PUNISHMENT, not a treatment.
I don't want your 'deepest sympathies' and it has everything to do with me and my father. YOU do not want me to be able to decide how to end my life and are an advocate. You: Use governement to control my life. Me: Remove government from my life.
Hmm. You advocate killing others if it is done by the state. Seems like a culture of death exists somewhere is that.
I wonder if Jesus believed in CP?
I’m not sure if you have a problem with anger or are simply unable to comprehend. Capital punishment has NEVER been an individual right, regardless of what you and your anarchist ilk believe.
I have been profoundly trained to take responsibility for my actions
Every Prescription I write, I am responsible for it's intended use
Every Prescription a Pharmacist fills, He is responsible for it's intended use
It is Burned into my bones
If I write a prescription intended for use in a suicide
I am responsible for the suicide
no matter how it is labeled
The Horror of this is beyond me
Do not ask it
I will be broken in the task
An my Oaths unmade
It would be better that I was not born
Live in Peace
And going a little further, he fell upon his face, praying, and saying: My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt. (Matthew 26:39)
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