With great caution, the Quebec College of Physicians is prepared to cross the line on the controversial debate over euthanasia and propose that it be included “as part of the appropriate care in certain particular circumstances.”
After examining the issue for three years, the College’s task force on ethics concluded that Quebec society has evolved to the point where it could tolerate euthanasia in specific circumstances. The task force’s recommendation will likely be part of a “reflection” document the College will release next fall, hoping that a public debate on the issue will pressure the federal government to eventually amend the criminal code.
“We are being very cautious in our approach,” said the College’s secretary, Yves Robert. “Avoiding the debate contributes to the general hypocrisy around this issue. To say that it doesn’t happen because it is illegal is completely stupid. … We have to stop hiding our head in the sand,” Dr. Robert said.
Anyone out there think Americans will stop hiding their heads in the sand?
It is common knowledge that physicians often have no choice but to constantly increase medication such as morphine to alleviate the pain and suffering of terminally ill patients.
Sometimes, the pain is so unbearable that the amount of painkillers or analgesics used to control it can be fatal. And this, according to the Quebec College of Physicians, can be viewed as a form of euthanasia.
“The question here is to decide whether a drop in dosage or an increase in dosage constitutes a criminal act,” Dr. Robert said. “We may go as far as to recommend that in certain cases, where the pain is unbearable, the amount of analgesic required could correspond to a form of euthanasia.”
The College wants to avoid a divisive confrontation between those who are for or against euthanasia, saying such a debate would solve nothing. Instead, the debate should be about the doctor’s role in accompanying a terminally ill patient toward the inevitability of death, offering as much dignity and medical assistance as possible. “There’s not a politician or a lawyer that can tell me what that entails,” Dr. Robert said.
Self-conscious people make decisions like this all the time. The only crime is that they are often forced to reflect upon the moment without being able to consult a doctor.
Euthanasia
Universal Health Care’s solution to long medical wait lines.
Republican solution to poor people.
#1 jbenson2
Pre-existing condition
Private health care’s solution to medical delivery
#3 Named
Universal Health Care
Obama’s solution to financial annihilation
old people have a duty to die and get out of the way. Idiotic to spend $$$ on terminally ill people without hope of any improvement in condition==creating and spending money only on a longer slower death often times while unconscious. Makes no sense EVEN if the money were available. When money is not available, it shows an inability to face reality and make hard yet considered decisions.
At a minimum, government should at least get out of the way of old terminal people who seek euthanasia. Waisting Money, denying care to others, interfering in private doctor/patients relationships, drawing out the dying process, increasing agony, denying reality, lying to relatives.
Yes, there are ways to save money and increase quality care in healthcare. We can start by not being fascists about it.
#1 and #2,
Nice glib answers to a very personal issue.
Obviously you have never had to stand by and watch your mother moan in agony for four weeks as a brain tumor slowly and excruciatingly took her life.
Frankly unless you have had to go through something like this, I don’t think your opinion should be counted.
[IMG]http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y22/Thacrudd/demotivational/suicide-booth-suicide-booth-futuram.jpg[/IMG]
Coming soon to a street corner near you.
#5, bobbo, I wouldn’t call it a “duty” per se, but it is the whole point of reproducing that we can’t live forever.
In a related note – it should be unsurprising that the better we are at keeping ourselves alive, regardless of how shitty we treat our bodies in the process, it only guarantees that the long-term medical costs for maintenance will keep increasing.
bobbo — Well said my friend.
Anyone else think that government should have no business approving or denying these kinds of issues?
Why is it lefties had integrity the roe v wade standard would apply. too bad they’re as incompetent and arrogant as the right wingers.
#8–SL==we are on dangerous ground. Arguing definitions “on point.” I agree “duty” is too strong a concept under today’s perceptions. It will however remain sound social and personal philosophy, even if a stretch goal.
#9–Rob==thanks. Any statement/idea can be wordsmithed. Usually takes more words and more time though. Just trying to make the record before the thread dies. (sic!)
#10–breeai==are you breetail as well or whatever the other spelling is? Breetail posts uniformily intelligently in opposition to the nonsense you just threwup.===”Anyone else think that government should have no business approving or denying these kinds of issues?”==how can the government pay for terminal care and not be in the business of approving or denying the care? Explain Yourself. By default, no response will show you spot your error.
#6 Steve – well said. In fact there’s nothing else to say.
I’ve read a statistic for quite a few years now that says 50% of the healthcare money spent in a person’s entire life is spent in the last six months of their life, as doctors try more and more expensive treatments to save ever more frail people, i.e. hip replacements for 80 year olds, etc.
Think of it, we could cut our health care costs by 50% if everyone died six months earlier than they do now. I know, it’s not that clear cut. But still.
People’s bodies wear out, and they die. If we could accept that, and accept that we really are mortal, maybe we wouldn’t have people clinging to life so desperately at the end.
Personally, if I ever find out I have a terminal illness, or something worse like Alzheimer’s that leaves a healthy body and an empty mind, I’m going to end it myself on my own terms.
@#5, 8: So, let’s bring back old Serbian custom: duty of the eldest child at the time at which elderly parent can’t contribute to the family as much as he/she consumes is to bake a bread, bring elderly parent, bread and big axe deep into the woods, sit down the parent, place bread on his/her head and chomp it down with the axe…
Insanity aside… Allowing euthanasia as a treatment for those who chose it provides a slippery slope to the condition above: euthanasia as a forced treatment to save resources. I hope we are well away from those dark ages. Particularly in the society where suicide is NOT criminal.
#12, A son,
Agreed.
#14–dismal==stupid argument. There is no flat terrain. Every spot is on several slopes. Slopes leading up and down, left and right, curved, backwards, no where. Silly to think identifying one of many possible consequences is adding anything to a conversation much less providing a conclusion.
Is there nothing in your terrain that would be a slippery slope towards protecting individuals from a tyranical government? No hide and carry gun permits into the ICU?
Slippy Slope. haw haw.
bobbo, since there little doubt that you will too die some day and there is nothing to end our suffering while you continue to live feel free to end it ASAP.
We shouldn’t have to worry about “youth in asia” as they’ll live long enough.
It’s the old people who should have a choice (a legal one) on how they want to live or die.
#1, benson the a**wipe,
I too have sat with people, including my own kin, as they suffered, waiting for death to come. That they were terminal was never the issue. That they had to suffer is. That a person must lay there in pain, confused as the bodies toxins take over, losing whatever dignity they had is so very wrong.
Asswipes like you think this is an issue of mass genocide by the government. No, but that issue is already with us as insurance companies continually cut off funds to pay for treatment. Many lives could have been saved and gone on to be productive in society if they had not been denied care when required during the early stage of illness.
Instead we listen to people like you trying to warn us this is what the government will do. Not only are you wrong about a already existing condition of our health care, but the Democrats want to eliminate that. Your selfish, sick bastard side shows.
#17–Gig==nothing to add heh? Glad you still muster the energy to be only insulting and nothing more. But I encourage you to actually add something substantive to the discussion. You must be anti-euthanasia then? Lets waste money on futile care? Lets force terminal people to suffer their measured share? I recall you are in the fundamentalist group? Posting like it anyway unless you provide something more.
But I take your point, and YES I agree. I also plan to off myself should I become terminal and need expensive care. I feel the duty and hope to rise to the occasion. But what if I get Alzheimers or religion? What help for me then?
Cue the ‘everyone is interdependent!’ arguments in favor of making this ‘treatment’ mandatory, especially once we get gov’t health care.
Did you people even read the entire article?
#20, Bobbo, the enlightened one,
But what if I get Alzheimers or religion? What help for me then?
Aaahhh, yes, a very serious, most costly ailment and the most dreaded mental illness found. How much society would improve if we could remove both scourges.
#22, brm,
And another one that only read the headline.
Also, you must have grown up in a foster home and could not care less if your (or any one’s) parents suffered through a long terminal illness. You must really hate yourself to wish the suffering and loss of dignity on others.
When you have a health system with budget problems, euthanasia becomes more attractive.
“Canadian doctors move to include euthanasia as appropriate care” … proving yet again how much more human their system is than ours.
Anyone who has ever explained to a child that “we had to put the dog/cat to sleep; s/he was suffering” is either lying to their children or providing better care to their pets than the provide for their parents.
IMNSHO, it is the latter.
(Oops, of course I meant humane, not human.)
#s 6, 19,
I have also seen worse than death and think that people should have a right to die with dignity.
You may be missing a key point here though. In the U.S. healthcare is a for-profit industry. The idea is to pump air through the meat that was once a human being until the money runs out, regardless of suffering, regardless of whether the “person” in question even has enough brain left to feel suffering, just keep pumping the air and providing horrifically expensive care until the money runs out. Then and only then may we finally pull the plug.
We really value human life in this once-great non-nation, don’t we?
Or, was that, we value life, as long as the life has money left and has not been either correctly or incorrectly convicted of a crime or has been ordered to yet another tour of duty or has a name that may sound just a tad like that of a known or barely suspected terrorist or ….. ?
#27, people who insist on keeping their family member (or pets) alive past when they should, usually are doing so for their own selfish reasons, and not out of the concern for the other.
http://thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23719250-details/BBC+conductor+Sir+Edward+Downes+and+wife+commit+suicide/article.do
Interesting article about a couple who committed suicide because of advanced age and ill health…
And I agree with #29 Scott — lots of money to be made on terminally ill people.