Category: Euthanasia

BMA reiterates opposition to assisted dying

The BMA has reiterated its firm opposition to legalising assisted dying in the face of renewed calls for a change in the law.

An editorial in the BMJ today calls for the Assisted Dying Bill championed by Lord Falconer to become law.

BMJ editor-in-chief Fiona Godlee, UK editor Tony Delamothe and patient editor Rosamund Snow argue that people should be able to exercise choice over their lives, which should include how and when they die.

They write: ‘Ultimately, however, this is a matter for Parliament, not doctors, to decide. Let us hope that our timid lawmakers will rise to the challenge.’

The BMJ is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the BMA but has editorial independence.

BMA council chair Mark Porter acknowledged there were strongly held views within the medical profession on both sides of the assisted-dying debate.

But he insisted: ‘The BMA remains firmly opposed to legalising assisted dying. This issue has been regularly debated at the BMA’s policy-forming annual conference and recent calls for a change in the law have persistently been rejected.’ . . . [Full text]

The doctors’ declaration of faith

The Economist

A.H.

THE scene had a melodramatic touch: two stone tablets with an engraved Declaration of Faith by Polish doctors who recognise “the primacy of God’s laws over human laws” in medicine were carried last month to a sanctuary in Częstochowa, in the south of Poland. The gesture was made out of gratitude for the canonisation of the Polish pope, John Paul II. It was the initiative of a physician and personal friend of the late pope, Wanda Półtawska.

The first 3,000 signatories of the declaration thereby announced that they will not violate the Ten Commandments by playing a part in abortion, birth control, in-vitro fertilisation or euthanasia. Abortion until the 25th week of pregnancy is legal in Poland if the mother’s life is in grave danger, the foetus is known to have severe birth defects or the pregnancy is a result of rape or incest.

Poland has 377,000 doctors and nurses so the signatories represent barely 1% of the medical profession. And among them are many students, dozens of dentists, four balneologists and a dance therapist (number 1805 on the leaked list). . . . [Full text]

Assisted suicide and euthanasia bill proposed in Australian Senate

Medical Services (Dying with Dignity) Exposure Draft Bill 2014

A bill to legalize physician assisted suicide and euthanasia has been proposed to the Australian Senate by Green Party Senator Richard di Natale.  Since it is an “exposure draft” it is not in the queue for passage. It includes provisions that provide protection for medical practitioners who refuse to provide the services for “any reason.”  However:

  • The objects of the Act set out in Section 3 do not include the protection of conscientious objectors;
  • The definition of “dying with dignity medical service” in Section 5 includes
    • euthanasia
    •  assisted suicide
    • providing information
  • Since Section 5 is broadly written, it appears that the attending medical practitioner can delegate the act of euthanasia to someone else.
  • Section 11(2)a states that a medical practitioner may refuse to provide euthanasia or assisted suicide “for any reason,” which would include reasons of conscience or religion, but
    • the section pertains only to medical practitioners
      • so it does not protect objecting pharmacists or other health care workers
    • Section 11(2)a does not state that medical practitioners may refuse to facilitate euthanasia or assisted suicide throught referral
  • Section 21 precludes coercion of objecting medical practitioners, but
    • does not preclude coercion of other objecting health care workers, and
    • can be understood to prevent hospices or denominational hospitals from enacting policies against euthanasia and assisted suicide
  • Section 24 provides protection from civil and criminal liability and disciplinary proceedings for medical practitioners who refuse to provide euthanasia and assisted suicide, but
    •  does not clearly offer similar protection to objecting practitioners, since refusing to provide euthanasia or assisted suicide cannot be said to be an omission “for the purposes of the Act,” which are specified in Section 3, and
    • offers no protection at all for other objecting health care workers.
  • There is no provision to protect persons who object to euthanasia for reasons of conscience from discrimination in education or employment.

Euthanasia rulings in Europe stir right-to-die debate

CTV News

The Associated Press

PARIS  — One French court acquitted a doctor of poisoning seven terminally ill patients while another ordered physicians to suspend treatment for a comatose man, while Britain’s top court said the country’s ban on assisted suicide may be incompatible with human rights.

The decisions of the past few days are fueling the arguments of Europeans who say the duty of doctors is to end the suffering of those beyond treatment.

But emotions run high on all sides around the issue of euthanasia and assisted suicide, as is shown by the bitter case of the comatose Frenchman, Vincent Lambert. Hours after the French court sided with his wife in ordering an end to treatment, the European Court of Human Rights blocked the move at the request of his parents, in a rare late-night ruling. . . [Full text]

Right-to-die already weighing on Quebec’s conscience

 New law has hospitals, doctors grappling with old fears, new moral burdens

Toronto Star

Allan Woods

MONTREAL—Quebec passed a landmark euthanasia law earlier this month meant to end the agony in the final days of a terminal patient’s life. But the legislation has lumped the province’s medical community with an existential burden it is only now confronting.

Doctors are weighing their consciences against their looming legal responsibilities to dying patients. It’s not entirely clear which one will win the day.

“I’ve been working in clinical ethics as a physician for 24 years and this is going to be one of our biggest challenges,” says Dr. Eugene Bereza, director of the centre for applied ethics at Montreal’s McGill University Health Centre.

The process that led to Bill 52, the so-called Medical Aid in Dying legislation, was wrenching enough in a society where the government, school and hospitals were a proxy for the Catholic Church not two generations ago. . . . [Full text]