Death With Dignity Act -

[Dalish]

The Death with Dignity Act is currently passed in Vermont, Oregon and Washington. The documentary How to Die in Oregon follows the stories of several individuals who invoke the act as terminal patients, one to her final decision.

I am personally very vehemently in favor of physician assisted suicide. I believe that suffering from a terminal illness is optional and that, because a doctor doesn't actually administer the lethal dose, it is definitely covered under "do no harm".

What are your opinions? Do you think a terminal patient has a right to physician assisted suicide? Why or why not?

 

[Ronald Gaygun]

People should be able to die whenever they want, however they want.

 

[OtterParty]

People should be able to die whenever they want, however they want.

That decision's way too irreversible to be taken that lightly.

 

[Ronald Gaygun]

That decision's way too irreversible to be taken that lightly.

I never said it wasn't a major decision to make, just that people should be able to decide on their own, without the interference of groups like the police or government. If I'm wheelchair-bound, incapable of speech and almost all motor-skills, an find my life enough of a living hell that I want someone to help me end my life, I don't want them to be charged with murder.
Perhaps I was a little to vague in my original post.

 

[OtterParty]

I never said it wasn't a major decision to make, just that people should be able to decide on their own, without the interference of groups like the police or government. If I'm wheelchair-bound, incapable of speech and almost all motor-skills, an find my life enough of a living hell that I want someone to help me end my life, I don't want them to be charged with murder.
Perhaps I was a little to vague in my original post.

That makes more sense. "Whenever they want, however they want" is a very bad idea for someone who's just extremely depressed and having the mother of all bad days at the moment. If it's someone in the right frame of mind and there's really nothing to be done, it should be their choice to make and it isn't my business to decide for them there.

About half a year back, I might have made a very awful decision if... well, it's over and I didn't. But maybe there should be counseling, at least. Not to talk them out of it, but to make sure they know exactly what they're doing and are in the right frame of mind to make that sort of decision.

Bit of a touchy subject for me. I'll stay clear now.

 

[Marvin]

I never said it wasn't a major decision to make, just that people should be able to decide on their own, without the interference of groups like the police or government. If I'm wheelchair-bound, incapable of speech and almost all motor-skills, an find my life enough of a living hell that I want someone to help me end my life, I don't want them to be charged with murder.
Perhaps I was a little to vague in my original post.

There are definitely situations where suicide should be permitted.

But it should still be highly regulated. Because of people with emotional problems.

 

[Dalish]

That makes more sense. "Whenever they want, however they want" is a very bad idea for someone who's just extremely depressed and having the mother of all bad days at the moment. If it's someone in the right frame of mind and there's really nothing to be done, it should be their choice to make and it isn't my business to decide for them there.

About half a year back, I might have made a very awful decision if... well, it's over and I didn't. But maybe there should be counseling, at least. Not to talk them out of it, but to make sure they know exactly what they're doing and are in the right frame of mind to make that sort of decision.

Bit of a touchy subject for me. I'll stay clear now.

I agree with this sentiment.

As it stands in the U.S., there are several safe guards that prevent individuals without a terminal illness that will give them less than six months to live. A doctor will not allow anyone that hasn't had that diagnosis from them to get the medication.

Abroad, I'm not sure of any act outside of Belgium, which allows for individuals with unbearable physical OR mental illness to choose physician-assisted suicide. That makes me uncomfortable.

As with unbovvered, I might have made a decision to end my life at one point or another due to my bipolar disorder. Mental illness should be treated with medication that gives patients a better quality of life, not death. Mental illness is not a terminal illness.

 

[ASoulMan]

I think people should have the right to choose whether or not they should be given life support and/or hospice care or live out their final days the way they want if they were terminally ill (like incurable cancer for example).

 

[Uzumaki]

I don't think anyone has the right to force anyone else to live against their will. I don't care how depressed you got at one point in your life or how that makes you feel about the situation, you don't have the right to tell someone they have to live. Period. Full stop.

It's like people who are against abortion because they considered aborting their kid and are glad they didn't. Take your head out of your ass and realize that the law isn't written to specifically coddle you and your situation. People besides you have rights.

Edit: "This shouldn't be a law because I might have abused it" is not a sufficient excuse.

 

[Wolf Fetuses]

If you have any experience of meeting someone with Huntington's Disease then you should support the right to die. In most cases, you stop being able to walk, lose your mind, have years bedridden and paralyzed before you forget how to swallow and choke on your own spit. It's not nice to see and even worse to contemplate the possibility of it happening to you (it's an autosomal dominant genetic thing). I'd much rather die quickly, peacefully on my own terms.

 

[fuzzypickles]

For patients who would likely die a slow and horrible death due to an illness, or are in a persistent vegetative state where any additional care would be futile, I support physician-assisted suicide as a legitimate way out of suffering. It's preferable to die in peace than to spend months or years suffering from an incurable, terminal illness.

 

[Shadow Fox]

I caught How to Die in Oregon on Netflix not too long ago. Definitely worth a look, if you're at all curious about the subject.

There are a number of safeguards in place to ensure the Death With Dignity act isn't abused. The patient must have a diagnosed terminal illness, they have to have a prescription for the medication that will end their life, and they must be capable of administering the medication to themselves without any physical assistance. (The documentary mentioned a case with one guy who had obtained the medication, but before he had the chance to use it, lost almost all motor skill and was therefore unable to give himself the meds, so he wound up dying a slow, lingering death regardless.)

I'm very much in favor of death with dignity. The "any life is better than no life" mentality a lot of people seem to have seems very simplistic and almost cruel. Do they really believe an end-stage cancer patient should be grateful to be alive, even though they're in constant agony, bedridden and enjoy no measurable quality of life? If that's what the patient wants, then so be it, but they shouldn't be forced to carry on just because some lawmakers are squeamish about the thought of someone not dying "naturally."

I've also always thought it somewhat hypocritical that we consider it an act of kindness and compassion to humanely euthanize animals when their quality of life has deteriorated, but refuse to extend that option to other humans.

 

[wheat pasta]

I remember how the media was blowing up over the girl with terminal brain cancer who chose to end her life.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brittany_Maynard
People were actually asserting that she shouldn't "kill herself" because "it's not what God would want". Because I guess God would want one of His children to suffer a terrible death wherein their brain slowly rots from cancer. I can't believe some people.
I'm 100% for this and I hope other states become more progressive about the idea. There are very strict regulations which prevent a depressed or bi-polar person from abusing such a law.
Medical science is advancing more and more each day, hopefully people in this country will change their minds about Death With Dignity after the awful choice Brittany had to make.

 

[AnimuGinger]

Barring psychiatric disorders such as depression, Bipolar, the like, I think people have the right to decide when to end their life. I also think people should be able to get help in ending their lives as painlessly as possible, especially if they're unable to end their own in some way, shape, or form.

Terminal cancer, severe liver/kidney failure, and other situations where the treatments can be more painful than the disease process itself with little hope of recovery. Look at it from both a moral and economic standpoint. Would you rather let someone suffer needlessly for a few months or years of a life they don't consider living, or would you rather they finish getting whatever they have to get done in order and leave the pain behind? Additionally, keeping someone alive through something like liver failure is amazingly expensive, especially once you have to admit them to a hospital. If the other organ systems begin to go, and they decide life isn't worth suffering through anymore, they should have the right to decide.

Granted, we have to account for some way to ensure that a person isn't being forced into deciding to live/die by their family. Advanced directives. Privacy. Those are the best options. I can't really understate how important it is to have an advanced directive on file, or prepared in some way, shape, or form. That's an entirely different thing, but it belongs here.

Maybe I've been shaped by helping take care of people who suffer, and who've wanted to die. But the way the majority of the country seems to view death sickens me. We shouldn't be afraid of it, and we shouldn't delay it against all odds when it isn't what someone wants. If Hell exists, I think there's a special place in it for people who try to force their family members to stay alive when they're suffering.

 

[Rat Speaker]

I don't think anyone has the right to force anyone else to live against their will. I don't care how depressed you got at one point in your life or how that makes you feel about the situation, you don't have the right to tell someone they have to live. Period. Full stop.

It's like people who are against abortion because they considered aborting their kid and are glad they didn't. Take your head out of your ass and realize that the law isn't written to specifically coddle you and your situation. People besides you have rights.

Edit: "This shouldn't be a law because I might have abused it" is not a sufficient excuse.

You just said what I couldn't fiure out how to articulate. Couldn't agree more.

 

[ZehnBoat]

i'm kind of curious about two things.
1. is there a safeguard against people wanting to commit suicide out of extreme emotion, and for no other reason?
there have been times i have seriously thought of killing myself, because sometimes your brain is a bitchy drama queen and wants you to feel like shit. and it would be rather shit for someone to just fly off the handle and be okayed to be killed. there must be a separation from feeling like shit, to "life is actually shit for this person"

2. is there a contract between the suicider and suicidee? i don't want people to go killing others and going LOL HE WANTED TO DIE SO I KILLED HIM LOLOL

i'm not saying that the laws don't have that, i just don't know. and i'm hoping those are in said laws.
because honestly, this law is important.

Edit: "This shouldn't be a law because I might have abused it" is not a sufficient excuse.

this is the kind of law must be done right, although it shouldn't be that hard to do right.
honestly, i think after hurricane katrina, and the story of the hospital staff that had to "kill" many patients to keep them from dying from drowning being put up for manslaughter (iirc, or just murder, i don't remember which) a law like this became something the country needed.
i hope soon this will come to my state, and i hope it passes... but, i don't know. it might not.

 

[PantsOfDesire]

@ZehnBoat. Yeah, there safeguards. This law is pretty narrowly focussed on people diagnosed with terminal illnesses, with six months or less to live. It's also not something a person could do on a whim or without demonstrating mental competency. This isn't a general right to die thing, and definitely not something where a person could batter a friend a death with a hammer and claim it to be both legal and consensual.

@Anathe. I don't see why mental disorders should be treated differently. So long as someone can prove they can make a sound decision, then why put mental illness in a separate category. One problem we face is in how we often place mental disorders in a weirdly separate category to conditions affecting the rest of the body. I don't know why we do it. Would not a terminal diagnosis or a severe physical disorder also lead us to wonder if the person is able to make sound decisions? All that should matter is to demonstrate that a person is capable of making the decision. Depression and other conditions are not things that get magicked away with therapy and bunch of drugs - these can be both chronic and very difficult to treat conditions. I see no reason to apply different standards, and to do so risks perpetuating the stigmatising of mental illness. Informed consent should be the only deciding factor.

 

[Megahertz]

Yeah, there safeguards. This law is pretty narrowly focussed on people diagnosed with terminal illnesses, with six months or less to live.

As long as those safeguards are in place, then I am supportive. How a terminal patient feels about their current life situation is more important than their loved one's attachments to them.