Physician assisted suicide

Oregon's status in 2009

Sponsored link.

2009 update:

According to reports issued by the Oregon health department, in:

However, some terminally ill persons who obtained prescriptions never used them. They presumably obtained them for future use just in case life became intolerable. As Char Andrews, an Oregonian with breast cancer, said:

"Having the choice gives me comfort -- just knowing that there's an option, knowing that there's a choice. This has taken the fear out of dying for me." ₂

In 2008, 60 of the 88 residents of Oregon who had obtained prescriptions during 2007 and 2008 committed suicide. This number still represents fewer than 1% of all of the deaths in the state.

Among the completed suicides:

On election day in 2008-NOV, physician assisted suicide was legalized in adjoining Washington state. The regulations closely matched the laws in Oregon.

Alex Schadenberg, the head of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition was concerned about the increase in the number of assisted suicides in Oregon. When the 2008 data became available in 2009-MAR, he said:

"The annual report continues to lack the essential information for determining the social context of these decisions. ... the reporting system continues to lack any safeguards for the people who die by assisted suicide based on the fact that reporting is completed by the physician who prescribes the lethal drugs."

"... there are no third party reports or investigations to ensure that the cases fulfilled the requirements of the law and/or that the reports are accurately reported. There are no investigations to confirm that reports were submitted for all assisted suicide deaths. In other words, we do not know whether other assisted suicide deaths occurred and we do not know if any of the people who died by assisted suicide were socially pressured or died outside of the guidelines of the law. ...  it is unlikely that any physician will ever submit a report that admits to decisions or actions that are outside of the legal parameters." ₃

PAS and hospice:

In the past, hospice support in dying and physician assisted suicide have been portrayed as two opposing methods of helping terminally ill patients who find living difficult to endure because of fatal illness.

However, it appears that this conflict is not shared by the terminally ill patients themselves. Compassion and Choices (C&C), the Oregon group that promotes choice in dying reported that 59 of the 60 individuals who took advantage of physician assisted suicide were enrolled in a hospice program. The group asks terminally ill patients who take the initiative to approach C&C whether they are in such a program.

LifeNews suggested that by asking patients who contact them whether they are in a hospice program, C&C staff were actually infiltrating the hospice movement. LifeNews reported that bioethics watchdog Wesley J. Smith said that C&C:

"should be ashamed, not proud. This press release is essentially an admission that its representatives interfere with the proper provision of hospice care, since an essential service of hospice is suicide prevention.

Copyright © 1997 to 2009 by Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance
Latest update and review: 2009-MAR-20
Author: Bruce A Robinson