Posted on 07/15/2014 12:11:19 PM PDT by wagglebee
The Daily Mail UK is reporting that a former euthanasia supporter, Professor Theo Boer, has told the House of Lords in the UK not to make the same mistake as the Netherlands.
Next week, the British House of Lords will debate the Falconer assisted suicide bill. Lord Falconer is a long-time supporter of assisted suicide who is also known for writing a one-sided report calling for the legalization of assisted death in Britain.
The Daily Mail reported Dr Boer to have told the House of Lords:
‘Don’t do it Britain,’
‘Once the genie is out of the bottle, it is not likely ever to go back in again.’
According to the Daily Mail report, Dr Boer, who is an academic in the field of ethics, had argued seven years ago that a ‘good euthanasia law’ would produce relatively low numbers of deaths. But, speaking in a personal capacity he said that
he now believed that the very existence of a euthanasia law turns assisted suicide from a last resort into a normal procedure.
Dr Boer, who is a Utrecht University academic who since 2005 has been a member of a review committee that monitors euthanasia deaths stated that:
Euthanasia is now becoming so prevalent in the Netherlands, that it is ‘on the way to becoming a default mode of dying for cancer patients’.
Assisted deaths have increased by about 15 per cent every year since 2008 and the number could hit a record 6,000 this year.
campaigns for doctor-administered death to be made ever easier ‘will not rest’ until a lethal pill is made available to anyone over 70 who wishes to die.
‘Some slopes truly are slippery,’
Dr Boer said that he was concerned at the extension of killing to new classes of people, including the demented and the depressed, and the establishment of mobile death units of ‘travelling euthanasing doctors’. He admitted that:
he was ‘wrong – terribly wrong, in fact’ to have believed regulated euthanasia would work.
‘I used to be a supporter of the Dutch law. But now, with 12 years of experience, I take a very different view.
The Daily Mail article quoted Paralympian, Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson, said:
‘What Dr Boer says comes as no surprise.
‘An assisted dying law is playing with fire, especially when there are no safeguards in place. Lord Falconer’s bill just isn’t fit for purpose.’
The article then quoted disability rights leader, Baroness Jane Campbell who stated:
‘As happens in Holland, Lord Falconer’s bill could end up encompassing significant numbers of seriously ill people.’
The 2013 Netherlands euthanasia statistics have not yet been released but the 2012 Netherlands euthanasia report indicated that there were 4188 reported assisted deaths, which did not include the unreported assisted deaths, that according to a Lancet study released in 2012 accounted for 23% of all assisted deaths. Therefore the real number of assisted deaths in 2012 was likely more than 5100 deaths.
The expansion of euthanasia in the Netherlands has been significant. Last year a healthy woman who was going blind died by euthanasia.
In February the Dutch Health Minister, Edith Schippers admitted that in 2013 there were 45 psychiatric assisted deaths in the Netherlands which was up from 14 in 2012.
Recently one of Netherlands most famous euthanasia advocates, psychiatrist Dr Boudewijn Chabot wrote an opinion in the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad that the Netherlands euthanasia law is derailed.
In his article Chabot referred to several psychiatric euthanasia deaths including:
a 54 year-old woman with a personality disorder, eating disorder and a chronic obsessive-compulsive neurosis.
a physically healthy man of 63 who was working for a government institution. He never had a relationship and the only thing he did his whole life was work. This man had been treated for a long time for depression, but the treatment didn’t work out.
Libertarians are, by their nature and philosophy, abhorrent of authority. This includes religious authority. As to social issues libertarians are libertines.In principle libertarians have trouble with criminal law for its constriction of personal freedom.
One cannot be a little bit libertarian and claim the mantle. Libertarians are cowards who refuse to take responsibility for themselves or others.
God has His reasons for what we go through. As least, that’s what I believe. I don’t ever second-guess God or His Plan.
Do you?
These people aren’t dying a natural death. They are artificially being kept alive by machines. They are being tortured. Unending torture. The older I get, the more terrified I am of being forced to go through what they are forced to go through. It should terrify everyone.
I read your post again and my answer is still the same.
I do NOT second guess God. Why would I? Why would you? He is our Creator. He is the CREATOR who loves us and wants us to spend eternity with him.
Are we promised a life of no pain or suffering? Are we promised a life with no problems? I don't think so.
Trying to stay close to God, prayer, good works, daily Mass and Communion, frequent Confession and praying the rosary EVERY day help to assuage my fears.
Our bodies last a few decades; eternity is for all time.
FEAR is the mind killer (Mua'dib). Satan tries very hard to plant doubts about God into our minds, hearts and souls. Don't listen to the Evil One.
Why spend FRUITLESS hours worrying about something that might or might not happen? Of course, if it's the way you want to live, then, by all means, fret and worry yourself into states of anxiety and terror; it's your right.
For ME, staying close to God (Mass, rosary) helps with those understandable fears. Being with good friends helps too. Mostly, it's the former.
God does not need daily mass nor saying a rosary for us to stay close to Him. He is my heart for now and forever. Jesus said that He would never leave nor forsake me. I believe Him. He doesn’t need props. A good Church with sound beliefs is good, as the people of God are our community and family. Together we worship Him in a way that we cannot do alone. This is because God is love and love takes others to experience it fully. Thank God that no matter what He is with me and I don’t need props! Jesus alone saves and keeps us.
That being said, it is time for the people of God to begin to rely on God for their health and their futures. Jesus has kept me all my life. He has healed me several times of deadly diseases. I have experienced unbelievable pain. It is better to die with Christ’s blessing than to live without it. He keeps His own.
Many martyrs for Christ were slowly roasted to death, split in half, fed to lions. Many were killed by authorities that were expert in gruesome, slow human torture which was done in ways that are too terrible for us to imagine. Many died gladly for Christ, even singing, realizing that Christ is worthy of anything this earth may do to us. He is worthy, and they are now in their eternal home with He who they have been blessed to love with their lives forever. We should hope to live up to their examples if we ever come into a situation where we must suffer and die for Jesus our love.
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