Grim truth

Grim truth about euthanasia
Dr. Death is much sicker and 'terminal' than vast majority of the people he killed
By LICIA CORBELLA, EDITOR,
Calgary Sun
June 10, 2007

Euthanasia, according to many, should be an issue of "choice".

Indeed, after a recent column I wrote about the June 1 release from jail of convicted murderer Jack Kevorkian (aka Dr. Death) I received many letters including one by a woman named Carol Anne from near London, Ont. who chastised me for opposing the legalization of euthanasia.

"It is truly a sick society when people treat their beloved pets more compassionately than the human race," wrote Carol Anne.

She states that if someone wants to die or be killed "it is their own free will" and "no one's business but their own." She closed her letter saying:

"Remember -- quality of life and dignity in death by your choice -- not society."

The main problem, of course, with Carol Anne's position is that in jurisdictions where euthanasia has become an accepted practice or a so-called choice -- people are often given no choice at all -- ever again.

Euthanasia is when a substance is administered to a person with intent to kill them. Euthanasia is NOT removing someone from life support.

There is an enormous moral divide between making someone die and letting someone die.

One is murder, the other is simply allowing nature to take its course.

The best living laboratory for the practice of euthanasia or doctor-assisted suicide exists in the Netherlands, where euthanasia has been practised openly since the late 1980s and was fully legalized in 2002.

What has taken place there should stop the debate about euthanasia entirely. Period.

Instead, just this week the California Assembly considered passing an assisted-suicide act, though in the end it did not have enough support.

A remarkable report entitled Medical Decisions About the End of Life," colloquially called The Remmelink Report, named after Prof. J. Remmelink, attorney general of the High Council of the Netherlands, was the first comprehensive Dutch study on euthanasia. It was released in September 1991.

Its findings were beyond alarming and should have stopped euthanasia dead. In 1990 alone, the study found:

- Dutch doctors actively killed 1,031 of their patients "without the patient's request."

Of those 1,031 people killed:

- 14% were found to be fully competent;

- 72% had NEVER expressed that they would want their lives ended;

- In 8% of the cases, doctors admitted performing "involuntary euthanasia" even though they believed other options were still possible.

Stop here and ponder those numbers. Really think about those 1,031 people. Who were they? What were their hopes and plans?

That's some choice, eh?

Get wheeled into hospital -- maybe you're unconscious and a bit mangled from a motorcycle accident or you've just suffered a stroke -- and your doctor, quite apart from any directive from you, decides to murder you, though it would be couched in the language of compassion and called "mercy killing" or "assisted suicide."

Perhaps said doctor had a golf game or a dinner party to rush off to, who knows.

Maybe said doctor is just a sadist obsessed with death, like Kevorkian.

Whatever the reason, in Holland in that one year alone, the tacit acceptance of euthanasia led to the premeditated killing of 1,031 people without their consent.

They were given no choice in that key decision and would never make any other choice ever again.

Is it any wonder many in Holland -- particularly the elderly -- have taken to carrying around "don't kill me" cards in their wallets?

If you're thinking 1990 was just an anomaly, you'd be wrong.

Another extensive report conducted in Holland in 1995 shows that 950 people were killed without their consent or request.

While euthanasia started out as a "choice" for elderly, terminally ill people in Holland, now Holland has established guidelines for when doctors may kill terminally ill newborns as well as infants born with mild deformities, such as spina bifida and cerebral palsy.

Recently a Quebec man was charged for helping his uncle with muscular dystrophy to hang himself.

It's expected this will reopen the debate of euthanasia being legalized in Canada.

People also argue that since it's going on anyway -- that many doctors may slip a little extra pain killer to a dying patient to hasten death -- that it should be legalized in order to provide "guidelines" and parameters for euthanasia.

But Rita Marker, an attorney based out of Steubenville, Ohio and executive director of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide said: "It's like saying that we know that some bankers embezzle therefore we should establish guidelines for embezzlement."

Upon his release from prison, Kevorkian -- who served eight years of a 10-25 year sentence for the second-degree murder of Tom Youk in 1998, which was taped and aired on the CBS show 60 Minutes -- promised he would no longer help people kill themselves.

He is also prohibited from providing care for anyone who is older than 62 or is disabled, or he could go back to prison if he violates his parole.

Those are ridiculous conditions considering many of the 130 people he helped kill were under the age of 40 and were not disabled or even suffering from any disease at all.

Indeed, Kevorkian, 79, is much sicker and "terminal" than the vast majority of the people he killed.

He suffers from a variety of ailments including hepatitis C, hardening of the arteries in his brain, liver disease, diabetes and high blood pressure and yet he said he didn't think he was a good candidate for assisted suicide.

He told the Detroit News: "No, remember I did not advocate assisted suicide, I only advocated a person should have the right to have an option if he or she, in sound mind, needed and desired it while in irremedial pain and suffering and terminal."

Yet, many of the young people he killed were simply mildly depressed, something a little bit of medication could have turned around.

As a result of euthanasia they will never make another choice again.

Ever.