Me on CBC – debating the euthanasia issue

It was a bit of an intense battle, and watching it again, I realize that I had been unable to make a point or two which happens in such debates.

One of the points I was trying to make before I was cut off, had to do with the nurses in Belgium who were acting outside of their legal boundaries. A study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal (June, 2010) indicated that the law was widely abused in that country. Almost one-third of euthanasia deaths were illegally performed without patient consent.

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. “It is likely many nurses ‘ under-reported’ their involvement for fear of admitting an illegal activity.”

The guidelines that Francois kept talking about will ultimately be seen as infringements on a perceived “right” to euthanasia. Much like the abortion issue now, where discussions on policy are virtually impossible, because any rational discourse is seen as an infringement on the so-called “constitutional right to abortion,” I think euthanasia will go the same way.  We will have little recourse when individuals who are not terminally ill or dying will claim their “right” and request death.

And I think that there will be serious issues with protection of conscience for physicians.

Moreover, “medical aid in dying “, as the law calls it, must be offered without exception by all public institutions in Quebec – hospitals, long-term care centres, CLSCs – regardless of the convictions of the management or staff of the institution.

I find that very troubling.

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