Liberal Massachusetts Defeated Assisted Suicide

http://www.lowellsun.com/todaysheadlines/ci_22157064/support-withered-assisted-suicide-ballot-question#ixzz2Egbgwy23

Support withered for assisted-suicide question

By Chris Camire

In late September, polls showed a ballot initiative that would make physician-assisted suicide legal for terminally ill patients had support from 68 percent of Massachusetts voters.

Over the next month, that support steadily eroded, and on Election Day the measure failed by a razor-thin 51-49 percent margin.

How did a proposal that seemed sure to pass just five weeks before the election come up short?

Joseph Baerlein, president of Rasky Baerlein Strategic Communications, who handled public relations for the Committee Against Physician Assisted Suicide, said the measure's opponents had to convince voters who supported the idea of assisted suicide that the bill before them was flawed.

"We focused our campaign strategy on looking at those weaknesses," said Baerlein.

Recipe for Elder Abuse

http://missoulian.com/news/opinion/mailbag/assisted-suicide-recipe-for-elder-abuse/article_261d7ce0-3e1f-11e2-8f87-001a4bcf887a.html

December 04, 2012 7:45 am

Brad Williams (letter, Nov. 28) is correct, assisted suicide is not legal in Montana (Associated Press, Nov. 16). The Montana Supreme Court decision, Baxter v. State, merely gives doctors a potential defense to prosecution for homicide.

In the 2011 legislative session, Sen. Anders Blewett and I introduced competing bills in response to Baxter, neither of which passed. His bill sought to legalize assisted suicide; mine sought to eliminate the defense.

During the hearing on Blewett's bill, he conceded that assisted suicide was not legal under Baxter. He said: "under the current law ... there's nothing to protect the doctor from prosecution."

Similar statements were made by others. For example, Dr. Stephen Speckart testified: "most physicians feel significant disease with the limited safeguards and possible risk of criminal prosecution after the Baxter decision."

To view a transcript, see:  http://maasdocuments.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/blewett_speckhart_trans_001.pdf

Legal assisted suicide is, regardless, a recipe for elder abuse in which heirs are empowered to pressure and abuse older people to cut short their lives.

Assisted suicide is not legal in Montana. The potential defense to prosecution is, however, a "toe in the door," which could lead to legalization in the future. Tell your legislators that you support reversing the defense to keep assisted suicide out of Montana.

Sen. Greg Hinkle, Thompson Falls

“Dr. Stevens, you saved my life!”

http://missoulian.com/news/opinion/mailbag/doctor-helped-patient-with-cancer-choose-life-over-assisted-suicide/article_63e092dc-37e5-11e2-ae61-001a4bcf887a.html?print=true&cid=print

 

Doctor helped patient with cancer choose life over assisted suicide

 

November 27, 2012 6:15

 

I am a doctor in Oregon, one of two states where assisted suicide is legal. This letter responds to your article about the controversy over this practice in Montana. (AP article re: Medical Examiners Board, Nov. 16). I write to clarify that legalizing assisted suicide would allow non-dying persons to be steered to suicide.

Oregon’s assisted-suicide law applies to patients predicted to have less than six months to live. In 2000, I had a cancer patient named Jeanette Hall. Another doctor had given her a terminal diagnosis of six months to a year to live. This was based on her not being treated for cancer.

At our first meeting, Jeanette told me that she did not want to be treated, and that she wanted to opt for what our law allowed – to kill herself with a lethal dose of barbiturates.

I did not and do not believe in assisted suicide. I informed her that her cancer was treatable and that her prospects were good. But she wanted “the pills.” She had made up her mind, but she continued to see me.

On the third or fourth visit, I asked her about her family and learned that she had a son. I asked her how he would feel if she went through with her plan. Shortly after that, she agreed to be treated, and her cancer was cured.

Five years later she saw me in a restaurant and said, “Dr. Stevens, you saved my life!”

For her, the mere presence of legal assisted suicide had steered her to suicide.

I understand that assisted suicide will be an issue in your upcoming legislative session. I urge you to encourage your legislators to clarify your law to keep assisted suicide out of Montana.

Kenneth Stevens,
Sherwood, Oregon

Assisted suicide leaves no room for doctors' errors or erroneous prognostications

 http://ravallirepublic.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_91d0a4cc-c434-5a41-9459-c808bf523634.html

 

Jeanette Hall's letter ( "Assisted suicide prompts some terminally ill patients to give up on life prematurely"), about how she would have died from assisted suicide if her doctor hadn't talked her out of it, hit a nerve. Her stated motivation was that she had been diagnosed with cancer and given six months to a year to live. That was 12 years ago.

 

Doctors do not know the future. They are often wrong. Indeed, this has happened twice in my family.

 

The first time was with my father. At age 66, he collapsed as he was leaving a doctor's appointment in the hospital at Glasgow. A week or so later his doctor recommended that we "pull the plug." I instead moved my father to another hospital. He fully recovered and lived nine more years. The doctor was wrong.

 

The second time was with me. When I was 62 years old, I was paralyzed due to a disease and put on a respirator. After four months, my doctors offered to take me off the respirator. They said that there was no chance of recovery. They said that if I lived, I would always be respirator dependent and a quadriplegic. Instead, I eventually lost my paralysis and even went back to work. My doctors, excellent doctors with years of experience, were wrong. It is now 14 years later.

 

Proponents of assisted suicide sometimes claim that assisted suicide is no different than pulling the plug. This is untrue. When you pull the plug, the patient doesn't necessarily die. If the patient does die, he or she dies due to his or her illness, not a lethal overdose.

 

I hope that we can keep assisted suicide out of Montana.

 

Jerry and Dora Lou Jacobson,

Glasgow

 

Assisted suicide: Idea is repugnant

http://missoulian.com/news/opinion/mailbag/assisted-suicide-idea-is-repugnant/article_f498f69c-407e-11e2-afae-001a4bcf887a.html

I was glad to see the letter in your publication by Brad Williams  (Nov. 28). Assisted suicide is an important topic for Montana, where proponents are wrongly claiming that the practice is legal and the majority of the population are senior citizens (over 50 years of age).

I retired from the Motion Picture Pension and Health Plans in Studio City, Calif., as the chief financial officer. One reason that I retired to Montana was that I had the perception that it was senior-citizen friendly, i.e., unlike Oregon and Washington, which have adopted laws allowing doctors and family members to assist people in killing themselves. That was repugnant to me.

The proposed legalization is for terminally ill persons. "Terminally ill" is a term that I am all too familiar with. In my previous employment, one would need to be terminally ill to qualify for a pension if they had not reached a specified age. Many, many times doctors deemed someone terminally ill and they wound up outliving their caregivers; not really, but they lived many years. If these persons had instead been applying for a lethal dose and used it, they would have been dead before their time.

Ted Friesen, Bigfork 

National disability rights group concerned Montana could legalize assisted suicide

http://missoulian.com/news/opinion/mailbag/national-disability-rights-group-concerned-montana-could-legalize-assisted-suicide/article_19f98ef0-38b0-11e2-ab52-0019bb2963f4.html

December 02, 2012

Not Dead Yet is a national disability rights group with members in Montana, some of whom are seniors. On behalf of our members, I write to say that we are extremely concerned that assisted suicide, sometimes euphemistically called "aid in dying," could be legalized in Montana.

It is estimated that there are 21,265 cases of elder abuse annually in Montana, reported and unreported (http://www.eadaily.com/15/elder-abuse-statistics).

Statistically, 90 percent of elder abusers are a family member or trusted other. Similarly, people with disabilities are up to four times more likely to be abused than their same-age nondisabled peers.

In Oregon and Washington, legal assisted suicide has opened new paths of abuse against persons who "qualify" to use these laws. A more obvious problem is a complete lack of oversight when the lethal drug is administered. If an abuser were to administer the drug without the person's consent, who would know?

It is simply naive to suggest that assisted suicide can be added to the array of medical treatment options, without taking into account the harsh realities of elder abuse and the related potential for coercion.

For more information about problems with legalization of assisted suicide, please see www.notdeadyet.org and www.montanansagainstassistedsuicide.org.Diane Coleman,
President/CEO,
Not Dead Yet,
Rochester, New York

Also published in the Ravalli Republic at
http://www.ravallirepublic.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_f695c2f6-65c7-5194-9276-43365fd08f35.html?print=true&cid=print