The bleeding edge of medical ethics

I've argued for a long time that when politicians and/or medical administrators try to give people the 'right' to decide for themselves when to end their lives, it'll be warped and twisted until that decision is made for them - whether they like it or not. I've already seen reports from Holland indicating that a number of doctors have 'euthanized' patients they regarded as beyond hope, irrespective of the patients' wishes. Now comes a report from Belgium that even nurses are taking the same decisions on behalf of their patients.

A high proportion of deaths classed as euthanasia in Belgium involved patients who did not ask for their lives to be ended, a study found.

More than 100 nurses admitted to researchers that they had taken part in 'terminations without request or consent'.

Although euthanasia is legal in Belgium, it is governed by strict rules which state it should be carried out only by a doctor and with the patient's permission.

The disturbing revelation - which shows that nurses regularly go well beyond their legal role - raises fears that were assisted suicides allowed in Britain, they could never be properly regulated.

Since its legalisation eight years ago, euthanasia now accounts for 2 per cent of deaths in Belgium - or around 2,000 a year.

The researchers found that a fifth of nurses admitted being involved in the assisted suicide of a patient.

But nearly half of these - 120 of 248 - also said there was no consent.

'The nurses in our study operated beyond the legal margins of their profession,' said the report's authors in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

. . .

Last night, Dr Peter Saunders, director of the Care Not Killing campaign in Britain, said: 'We should take a warning from this that wherever you draw the line, people will go up to it and beyond it.'

'Once you have legalised voluntary euthanasia, involuntary euthanasia will inevitably follow,' he added.

There's more at the link.

It's ironic to see a British doctor warning about the dangers of this sort of thing. In Britain, it's already legal for doctors to decide to withhold medication and nutrition from terminally ill patients. There have already been court cases where relatives of the patient have sued to stop this practice - and been denied.

As far as I'm concerned, no-one has the right to make decisions about life or death on behalf of any other human being (we're talking outside the justice system, of course). It's your life, and your right to make your own decisions according to your own religious, moral and ethical perspectives. If we surrender that right into the hands of others, it will, repeat, will be misused.

The moral of the story? Don't trust 'big medicine' or 'big government' or 'big brother' or anything or anyone else to preserve your right to life. You'd better have family and/or friends who'll go to bat for you when necessary - otherwise you might end up as just another euthanized statistic.





Peter