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Here are the latest updates for kathrynltucker@yahoo.com "Medical Futility Blog" - 1 new articleNeil Gorsuch and End of Life Liberty
Judge Gorsuch's views on
what he erroneously terms "Assisted Suicide" are very alarming to
those who support the right of terminally ill patients to choose a more
peaceful death via aid in dying. This refers to the practice where a physician
prescribes medication for a mentally competent terminally ill patient, which
the patient may ingest to achieve a peaceful death. Modern medicine can extend the dying process
so that some patients find themselves trapped in an experience they find
unbearable. Thus the option of AID is widely supported nationwide, the vast
majority of Americans, around 70%, as well as by doctors, by an almost 2 to 1
margin, 57% to 29%. Six states now permit this practice.
Judge Gorsuch asserts
that "all human beings are intrinsically valuable", but he envisions
a "legal system that allows for terminally ill patients to refuse
treatments that would extend their lives", which has been the law now for
several decades. According to his
reasoning, a dying patient may have life sustaining treatment stopped, for
example refusing continued treatment with a ventilator, knowing she will die,
and where the doctor who withdraws the ventilator plays an active role in the
resulting death. But, another dying patient not on life extending treatment, suffering
equally or even more, would be prohibited, according to the position taken by
Judge Gorsuch, from securing a prescription for medication the patient could
ingest to achieve a peaceful death, even though the doctor plays a more limited
role in the resulting death. It is both unreasonable and unjust to deny the
second patient the right to die on her terms, but to allow the first patient to
do so, when the intention of both patients is the same and the result is the
same.
Finally, competent dying
patients who seek a more peaceful death via
aid in dying are not suicidal; the term "assisted suicide" has
been rejected as inaccurate and pejorative by health care organizations and in
the laws allowing aid in dying. Unlike those who commit suicide (and could
continue to live but choose not to) terminally ill patients do not want to die,
but they are dying. It is only a
question as to how these patients will die.
Oregon’s law permitting AID has worked well over 20 years and none of
the problems speculated about by opponents have presented.
How one crosses the
threshold to death when confronted by death due to terminal illness is a
profoundly personal and private matter. Terminally ill, mentally competent
adult patients should be able to die on their terms.
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