Physician-Assisted Suicide Is Not Progressive

[KamaAina]

And no, this is not from my friend who also writes on the subject.

http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/10/physician-assisted-suicide-is-not-progressive/264091/

The issue of legalizing physician-assisted suicide doesn't fall cleanly along liberal-conservative lines. However, it's fair to say that most social conservatives ardently oppose assisted suicide, while a clear majority on the political left support legalization. That's the case in Massachusetts where Question 2 is on November's ballot, and according to recent polling is very likely to pass.

I am an outlier, in that I am a registered Democrat and progressive, as well as a physician who has cared for people with life-threatening conditions for more than three decades. I support universal health care, voting rights, disability rights, women's rights, Planned Parenthood, gay marriage, alternative energy, and gun control. I yearn to see an end to the war on drugs and the war in Afghanistan. And, I am convinced that legalization of physician-assisted suicide is something my fellow progressives should fear and loathe.

When cast as a rights issue, it's hard for progressives to resist. But "the right to die" is just a slogan. No civil right to commit suicide exists in any social compact. Human beings have a biologically imposed obligation to die; and, as Jean Paul Sartre reminded us, suicide is always an option. However, even if a civic right to suicide did exist, suicide and assisted suicide are very different things. Suicide might be a purely private act; but physician-assisted suicide involves two people, one of whom is trained, certified, licensed, and compensated by society....

An authentic progressive agenda for improving the way we die would begin by tying physician and hospital payments to quality of care, not quantity of tests and treatments, and doubling the ratio of nurses and aides to residents in nursing homes. (Honoring the inherent dignity of a person starts with ensuring there's someone to answer the bell when the person needs help getting to the bathroom.) Also high on a liberal agenda should be repealing regulations that require sick people to give up life-prolonging treatments to receive hospice care. Finally, it's past time to insist that every medical student receives adequate training and passes competency tests in symptom management, communication and counseling related to serious illness and dying -- skills that most physicians lack today.

[enough]

1. A spurious argument.

We need to have everything the author says we need to have in our healthcare system. No doubt about it. We also need to have the right to assisted suicide.

A few years ago, I spent several years taking intimate daily care of my two very elderly parents. They had excellent pensions. They had magnificent health insurance. They had sufficient financial resources to have whatever care they wanted or needed. Their access to truly superb healthcare did not provide the one thing they needed and wanted: rational, humane, merciful assisted suicide.

When the time comes that I am as old as they were at the end of their life, I will not have all those resources. I hope that by that time, assisted suicide will be possible. In the meantime, I'm making what arrangements I can to facilitate what may become necessary outside the system. It would be far better if it could be done within the system.

[Ms. Toad]

2. He's set up a false dichotomy.

Of course it is progressive to advocate for providing everyone with the means to quality end of life care.

From this very valid premise he concludes that physician assisted suicide is an substitute for providing everyone with the means to quality end of life care and is must be rejected because we can't have both. (That's a bit simplistic, but it is the gist of what he is saying).

One is not a substitute for the other. Even with quality end of life care, there are times when an individual may still want to end his or her life prior to the time they would expire without assistance - permitting them to do so is also progressive.

[Curmudgeoness]

12. You got the gist of his argument right,

at least that is how I saw it as well. It is not an either/or situation. And just because you give people the option does not mean that you are going to force them to take it if they do not want to go that route.

This physician makes it seem like assisted suicide and personal suicide are the same thing. They are so far from that. Assisted suicide is planned to be pain-free and not to fail. When someone is desperate enough to attempt suicide on their own, the results can be catastrophic. I cannot believe that he doesn't realize that.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

3. I disagree with this article.

Assisted suicide IS a progressive idea.

Oregon is doing it right. When we put our pets to death, we are treating them more humanely than we do the people we love. Treating them humanely. How ironic that this is in reference to our pets.

When a patient has the medications s/he needs to take in order to die, that patient has the peace of mind that s/he should have. Oftentimes, the patient doesn't even take them. Just having them is enough. Knowing that they can die and end the torment of a cruel death is sufficient for their peace of mind.

It's time for this to be legal everywhere.

[KMOD]

5. agreed! n/t

[onyourleft]

6. Absolutely, Peggy.

Thank you.

[scarletwoman]

7. This is an old article, it's from 2012.

I don't remember when Oregon passed its assisted suicide law, but I certainly would prefer to read a more recent argument against it than something from some archive.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

8. It became law in 1994; I just googled it.

Here's the link: http://www.finalexit.org/oregon_assisted_suicide_law.html

[Bluenorthwest]

9. Oregon's Death With Dignity Act became law in 1997

nt

[Hoyt]

4. Sorry, I consider Jack Kevorkian a pioneer and social activist.

[Hoppy]

10. I recall my father's death from cancer.

He smoked unfiltered "Lucky's" (unfortunate name) from the time he entered the army in 1938, until four months before his death in 1998. It seems oxygen tanks and cigarettes don't get along too well.

He smoked three packs a day of unfiltered Lucky strike. Its amazing he lived as long as he did.

Anyway, it caught up with him. His larynx was removed in July and about two weeks later, the surgeon said he hadn't removed all of the cancer and that it was now terminal.

The oncologist comes in and says he will linger on and eventually his organs will collapse and he will die. The best thing that can happen is if he gets a heart attack in response to the stress to his body. But once again, he wasn't that lucky.

Around October, he was placed in a nursing home with hospice. He was mostly unconscious. I recall one of the nurses saying his eyes were drying and they would have to sew his eyelids shut unless someone was there to put eye drops every few hours.

My mother stayed in the room with him, putting eye drops in until he died on Christmas day, 1998. Merry Christmas!

I don't know if he would have wanted assisted suicide if it were available. I do know it is a choice I would make but I can't in New Jersey.

You see, New Jersey politicians would rather pander for votes. Pander to people who are afraid of their sky god. Pander to people who are afraid of their own death to the point that they have the obligation to extend life to its natural conclusion. For others, this is because they are afraid their heirs will use assisted suicide to cause them to end their own life in order to get to the inheritance faster... or to make sure the pot of money doesn't dwindle.

It is interesting that some of these same "life has value" people have no problem strapping a guy, especially a black guy, to a gurney and injecting poison into his body. Then, to paraphrase George Carlin, they can go home and jerk off after watching this show.

To me, its simple. If you don't like assisted suicide, don't do it. But don't use your fears as a basis to deny me the right to a quick death, one that is with the least discomfort to me and the people who love me.

[GeorgeGist]

11. Veterinarians are more compassionate.

If that's not progressive, I'm guilty too.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

13. I don't see an argument against assisted suicide here.

Lots of other things that we should probably do as well, but no argument for not doing that.

[Curmudgeoness]

14. I have watched too many people die a prolonged and torturous death.

Both of my parents died of cancer, and it was not pretty. And it was not painless no matter how much medications they are given. I do not want to go that way.

My uncle lived in Oregon, and when he got sick enough, he chose assisted suicide. He died at 92 in September with family and friends around him. It was a peaceful passing. It was humane and it was compassionate and it was peaceful. That is what I want.