In a little more than a week voters in Massachusetts will decide whether to allow doctors to “prescribe medication, at the request of a terminally ill patient meeting certain conditions, to end that person’s life.” A similar bill is being debated in New Jersey. Unfortunately, like so many health care questions, the debate about physician-assisted suicide is confused, characterized by four major falsehoods.
Whom does legalizing assisted suicide really benefit? Well-off, well-educated people, typically suffering from cancer, who are used to controlling everything in their lives — the top 0.2 percent. And who are the people most likely to be abused if assisted suicide is legalized? The poor, poorly educated, dying patients who pose a burden to their relatives.
New York Times
“Four Myths About Doctor-Assisted Suicide”
October 27, 2012
View
