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I have a hard time picturing it,
even eight years later. If there were ever a man less given to self-pity than
my brother-in-law I never met him, yet whom of us wouldn’t break at least once
at the thought of imminent death?
Fear wasn’t an issue. Devoutly
Christian, he felt sure of his place. It was more that you’re not supposed to
die at 37, even of cancer. Not with a wife and three young children, not with
so much undone. That he could remain so relentlessly upbeat testified to both
the man and his faith.
But once, alone in the bathtub,
my sister found him weeping at the thought that his youngest might not remember
him. Yet those rare dark moments seemed only to motivate him to survive. There
was no notion of ending it.
Last week’s conviction of Jack
Kevorkian for the second degree murder of a Las Vegas man has again brought the
issue of assisted suicide to the forefront, not that it has been that far
removed. We Californians defeated a state proposition in 1992 that would have
allowed the procedure; a Berkeley assemblywoman is now attempting to undo the
ballot box with legislation. Our neighbors in Oregon approved their “Death With
Dignity Act” in 1994, though it was not enacted until last year.
This February the
New England Journal of Medicine printed a study on the 15 assisted suicides
reported in Oregon during 1998. While the study did support some of the
campaign assertions made by the Act’s proponents, such as no botched, lingering
deaths or suicides for financial reasons, it is generally pretty stark.
Supporters had
promised that assisted suicide would be a last resort, applied only in cases of
unbearable pain. They said that most would die with the advice and support of
their family doctor, professionals who would know them well and hold their
interests at heart.
Yet only one death
patient listed concern over pain as their motivation. Six of the 15 sought
lethal prescriptions from two or more doctors. The first to take advantage of
the law had seen the physician who wrote her lethal prescription for less than
three weeks; her own doctor refused, as did a second who diagnosed her as
depressed. A suicide advocacy organization finally directed her to an amenable
physician.
The report
concludes that “the decision to request and use a prescription for lethal
medication was associated with concern about loss of autonomy or control of
bodily functions, not with fear of intractable pain or concern about financial
loss.” Disability activists worry that suicides assisted for concern over
needing help in the bathroom and other activities will affect far more disabled
and elderly people than those terminally ill.
But is their fear reasonable?
According to a Journal of Medical Ethics study of euthanasia in the Netherlands,
which has one of the world’s oldest assisted suicide laws, the process is
“beyond effective control.” Patients need not be terminally ill to be assisted
in suicide. The depressed are dispatched regardless of whether they suffer any
organic disease, while children with birth defects can be euthanized based on
their presumed low quality of life. In an incredible 20% of Dutch assisted
suicides, amounting to almost 1,000 annually, the patient did not request it.
Despite the personal cost, my
brother-in-law both gave and received priceless gifts of devotion in those last
days and was able to meet his first grandchild (from a previous marriage).
Still, I can understand some of the arguments in favor of assisted suicide.
There are the issues of personal autonomy and consent, though proper treatment
for pain and depression can eliminate the desire to die. I can’t help but
wonder if our efforts wouldn’t be better spent there.
I always appreciate letters and
emails that take honest issue with me, particularly on nerve-scorchers such as
this. Now is no exception, but I implore dissenters to spare me the “you can’t
legislate morality” patter. You not only can, societies throughout time have
proven that you must. I know of none that haven’t and survived.
The real
question, then, is which values we will sanction. Given that, put me down for
the inestimable gift of life.
© 1997 – 2002 Brent Morrison
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