Stephen Drake on Assisted Suicide of Deaf-Blind Twins in Belgium

Read this story, which includes a powerful response from a deaf-blind blogger.

Bioethicist Art Caplan Supports Massachusetts Assisted Suicide Referendum, Not Dead Yet's Stephen Drake Responds

You can find Caplan's views here.  Drake's response is here.

Ezekiel Emanuel on Physician-Assisted Suicide

See this opinion piece by Dr. Emanuel on the New York Times's website.  The conclusion:

Instead of attempting to legalize physician-assisted suicide, we should focus our energies on what really matters: improving care for the dying — ensuring that all patients can openly talk with their physicians and families about their wishes and have access to high-quality palliative or hospice care before they suffer needless medical procedures. The appeal of physician-assisted suicide is based on a fantasy. The real goal should be a good death for all dying patients.

Coleman on Assisted Suicide Laws and the ADA

At the Not Dead Yet blog, Diane Coleman has this post arguing, on the occasion of the statute's 22d Anniversary, that laws allowing assisted suicide violate the ADA.

Peace and Coleman and Drake on "Being Pushed to Choose Death"

Stephen Drake from Not Dead Yet blogs here about an online essay he and his colleague Diane Coleman recently posted on the Hastings Center's Bioethics Forum.  The essay responds to an essay authored by Bill Peace and recently published in the Hastings Center Report.  Both essays are well worth the read.  Here is the abstract of Peace's essay:

It is 2 a.m. I am very sick. I am not sure how long I have been hospitalized. The last two or three days have been a blur, a parade of procedures and people. I had a bloody debridement for a severe, large, and grossly infected stage four wound-the first wound I have had since I was paralyzed in 1978. I know the next six months or longer are going to be exceedingly difficult. I will be bedbound for months, dependent upon others for the first time in my adult life. As these thoughts are coursing through my mind, a physician I have never met and the registered nurse on duty appear at my door. As they put on their gowns I am weary but hopeful. Surely there is something that can be done to stop the vomiting. The physician examines me with the nurse's help. Like many other hospitalists that have examined me, he is coldly efficient. At some point, he asks the nurse to get a new medication.

What transpired after the nurse exited the room has haunted me. Paralyzed me with fear. The hospitalist asked me if I understood the gravity of my condition. He grimly told me I would be bedbound for at least six months and most likely a year or more. That there was a good chance the wound would never heal. If this happened, I would never sit in my wheelchair. I would never be able to work again. Not close to done, he told me I was looking at a life of complete and utter dependence. He went on to tell me I was on powerful antibiotics that could cause significant organ damage. He informed me I had the right to forego any medication, including the lifesaving antibiotics. If I chose not to continue with the current therapy, I could be made very comfortable. I would feel no pain or discomfort at all. Although not explicitly stated, the message was loud and clear. I can help you die peacefully.

And here are the first two paragraphs of Coleman and Drake's essay:

It's difficult for us to believe that Bill Peace's story would really surprise anyone entrenched in bioethics and “end of life” issues. Anyone paying close attention to various news stories and occasional journal articles would be pretty sure there are more stories – some arguably worse – just waiting to be told. For a story, of course, you need a survivor who is able and willing to tell it. And of course, the storyteller needs a venue – we owe Bill Peace and The Hastings Center our thanks for making those elements come together. 

The most surprising thing about Bill Peace's article concerning his experience with the hospitalist is that it appeared in a bioethics journal at all. The second surprising aspect of his experience is that we're having a publicly accessible discussion about it. The many ways that medical professionals push disabled people toward death are absent from journals – or masked in jargon and euphemisms. Subjects like Bill Peace's story are certainly absent in venues in which bioethicists engage the public – as though there are discussions that the professional class would prefer we (the public) not be a part of. Recently, however, the wall of silence shows signs of cracking.

B.C. Supreme Court Invalidates Canadian Statute Prohibiting Physician-Assisted Suicide

Not Dead Yet has the news.

Coleman and Drake WSJ Op-Ed Opposing Massachusetts Assisted Suicide Referendum

Not Dead Yet's blog links to Diane Coleman and Stephen Drake's Wall Street Journal op-ed opposing assisted suicide.  The full op-ed is available to subscribers only, and it's well worth a read.

Georgia Supreme Court Invalidates Advertising-Assisted-Suicide Statute on First Amendment Grounds

Today's opinion in Final Exit Network, Inc. v. State is here.  As Not Dead Yet's blog notes, "[t]his is not exactly unexpected," as the state law at issue does not ban assisting someone in suicide; it bans publicly advertising that you will assist someone in suicide.

Assisted Suicide Should Be Legal, Says Major Report to Parliament

See this article by that title from the Guardian.  It begins:

MPs should consider changing the law on assisted suicide to allow some terminally ill people to end their lives at home with the help of their doctor, a major report into the subject has concluded. 

The Commission on Assisted Dying, chaired by the former lord chancellor Lord Falconer, says a choice to end their own lives could be safely offered to some people with terminal illnesses, provided stringent safeguards were observed. 

Describing the current law on assisted dying as "inadequate and incoherent", the commission will today outline a legal framework that would permit only those who had been diagnosed with less than a year to live to seek an assisted suicide, and then only if they met strict eligibility criteria.

The commission at issue appears to have been put together by a right-to-die group called Dignity in Dying.

Media Roundup on GA Assisted Suicide Arguments

Not Dead Yet's blog has a series of links.

Disability Activists Urge Georgia Supreme Court to Uphold Prosecution of Final Exit Network

See this press release by that title from Not Dead Yet.  As the press release indicates, the case involves an interesting First Amendment question.