Oregon Suicide Law Not Legal (4 views) Subscribe   
  From:  David (DavidABrown)    11/19/2001 10:47 am  
To:  ALL   (1 of 16)  
 
  270.1  
 
National Right to Life Files Brief to Support Ashcroft Decision

Washington, DC -- The National Right to Life Committee and Oregon Right to
Life today filed a friend of the court brief in the case challenging the
recent decision of U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft that the Controlled
Substances Act does not permit the use of federally controlled drugs for
assisted suicide.  Under the Ashcroft decision, physicians who prescribe
controlled drugs for assisted suicide could lose their licenses to
prescribe any federally controlled drugs, which would effectively end the
medical practice of many doctors.

The State of Oregon brought suit against the Ashcroft ruling last week,
charging that it effectively nullifies Oregon's law permitting
physician-assisted suicide for the terminally ill.  Oregon is the only
state to have legalized physician-assisted suicide.  Oregon was joined in
the suit, Oregon v. Ashcroft, by a number of persons seeking assisted
suicide, a physician, a pharmacist, and an assisted suicide advocacy
organization.  They asked Portland, Oregon, federal district court judge
Robert E. Jones to temporarily enjoin the effect of the ruling pending
full review of the legal issues.

The National and Oregon Right to Life brief argues that Ashcroft's
decision was fully justified because the federal government can choose to
protect all human life through its laws even if the State of Oregon has
chosen not to do so.  "Just because Oregon allows its doctors to prescribe
lethal drug overdoses to patients doesn't mean that the federal government
has to agree that this is a legitimate medical use of the drugs," said
James Bopp, Jr., General Counsel of the National Right to Life Committee.
"The Oregon tail doesn't wag the federal dog.  The U.S. government can
protect all human lives even if Oregon turns its back on some of them."

The brief also argues that the Ashcroft decision avoids constitutional
problems by refusing to discriminate against terminally ill persons in
enforcement of federal drug laws.  "There would obviously be an equal
protection problem if the federal government said that you can use these
drugs to kill the sick and disabled, but not everyone else," said Bopp.

To be granted a preliminary injunction, Oregon and the individuals who
brought suit must show that they would be irreparably injured if the
Ashcroft decision goes into effect.  The brief argues that this is not
possible.  "The only harm anyone can claim is that some people will
continue to live unless they can get drugs to kill themselves," stated
Bopp.  "But just being alive is something that the law has never
recognized as an injury."  The Ashcroft decision actively encourages the
use of federally controlled drugs to relieve pain and suffering.

Judge Jones will hear oral argument on the request for preliminary
injunction next Tuesday, November 20, and he is expected to rule within
sixty days.  His decision will probably be appealed by a losing party to
the U.S.  Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco.

The brief can be found at
http://www.ortl.org/spotlight/amici_curiae_brief.pdf and it requires Adobe
Acrobat to read.




David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    11/19/2001 10:49 am  
To:  ALL   (2 of 16)  
 
  270.2 in reply to 270.1  
 
Survey Finds Australian Doctors Have Helped Hasten Death

Sydney, Australia -- A survey of Australian doctors has found one third
administered high doses of painkillers to hasten the death of terminally
ill patients.

Australia's leading euthanasia crusader Philip Nitschke said the survey
revealed the need to legalise euthanasia in Australia, while
anti-euthanasia groups condemned the study.

The survey of almost 700 doctors, to be published in the Medical Journal
of Australia on Monday, found 250 doctors had given painkillers in doses
greater than necessary. The doctors' first intention was to relieve
suffering, but they were aware the high dosage would hasten death,
according to the survey by Australia's Newcastle University.

About 20 percent of the doctors said they had taken the action without an
explicit request from the patient.

Euthanasia is illegal in Australia. However, it is legal for a doctor to
administer drugs to keep a terminally ill patient comfortable even if this
incidentally hastens death.

The Australian Medical Association, which represents doctors, is opposed
to legalising euthanasia. "To license doctors to kill people is really a
step society should not be taking," said AMA spokesman Dr Trevor Mudge.

In 1996, Australia's outback Northern Territory introduced the world's
first assisted suicide laws. Four people used the laws to die via lethal
injection administered via a computer. However, the euthanasia laws were
short lived with the national government overturning the legislation in
1997.

Nitschke, who helped the four die in the Territory, said the survey
revealed the need for euthanasia laws that provide a quick death for
terminally ill patients and protect doctors.

Right to Life Australia chairwoman Margaret Tighe condemned the study,
saying some doctors probably gave extra doses of pain-killers without the
intention of hastening death.

"There may be some who find it necessary to end the patient's pain and
suffering but not do it because they want the patient to die," Tighe said.

--
Roe v. Wade:  28 Years of Life Denied
http://www.roevwade.org




David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    11/21/2001 7:23 am  
To:  ALL   (3 of 16)  
 
  270.3 in reply to 270.2  
 
Source:   Associated Press, Salem (OR) Statesman Journal; November 20,
2001

Judge Extends Block on Ashcroft Assisted Suicide Order

Portland, OR -- A federal judge extended a court order Tuesday that blocks
an attempt by pro-life Attorney General John Ashcroft to dismantle
Oregon's one-of-a-kind law allowing assisted suicides.

U.S. District Judge Robert Jones extended his Nov. 8 temporary restraining
order and gave attorneys up to five months to prepare arguments in
Oregon's case against the Justice Department. The judge said his order
``nullifies giving any legal effect'' to Ashcroft's directive - in other
words, doctors should not fear legal repercussions if they follow the
Oregon law.

The state has asked Jones to permanently block Ashcroft's Nov. 6 order
that prohibited doctors from prescribing lethal doses of federally
controlled drugs to terminally ill patients. At least 70 people have used
the law since it took effect, according to state health officials. All
have done so with a federally controlled drug.

Ashcroft's order prompted the court challenge, with Oregon officials
saying the government was trying to strip the state of its right to govern
the practice of medicine.

During a four-hour hearing, Justice Department attorneys argued that
Oregon does not have the right to be an exception to federal drug laws.
But Steve Bushong, an Oregon assistant attorney general, argued that
Ashcroft's order exceeded powers given to him by Congress.

The judge also voiced displeasure with the way Ashcroft had issued the
order - he has called it an ``edict'' - and questioned whether the order
might discourage doctors elsewhere worried about overprescribing pain
medication. Jones posed a hypothetical situation requiring a doctor to
prescribe so much medicine to a patient suffering great pain it renders
him or her unconscious, and then hastens death.

Such situations are common, the judge suggested. ``Doctors are then
subjected to scrutiny,'' Jones said. However, Ashcroft confirmed that
doctors prescribing medication to control pain with the intent of
alleviating pain -- not killing the patient -- will not be subject to
prosecution.

Under Oregon's assisted suicide law, doctors may provide - but not
administer - a lethal prescription to terminally ill adult state
residents. It requires two doctors to agree the patient has less than six
months to live, has voluntarily chosen to die and is capable of making
health care decisions. The measure was approved by voters in 1994,
survived legal challenges, and was re-approved in a 1997 referendum.

In his directive, Ashcroft said prescribing, dispensing or administering
federally controlled substances to assist suicide violates the Controlled
Substances Act, passed by Congress in 1970 as part of the nation's war on
drug use.

Many Oregon doctors have been reluctant to assist suicides because of
Ashcroft's order, said Brad Wright, who is with Compassion in Dying, a
group that advocates assisted suicide.

Oregon's U.S. attorney, Michael Mosman, declined to comment on the U.S.
government's position, letting the brief filed Friday by federal lawyers
speak for itself.

"We'll leave any response we've found to their arguments in our (written)
arguments," Mosman said.

According to that brief, Ashcroft was well within the authority provided
him under the Controlled Substances Act to prohibit the use of federally
controlled substances for assisted suicide.

The brief also dismisses the state's assertion of irreparable injury if
Ashcroft's directive is allowed to take effect. As for the terminally ill
patients alleging potential harm under Ashcroft's directive, the brief
concedes their potential injury is "pain and the fear of pain."

Federal lawyers submitted to the court declarations from six doctors
stating that "these patients need not fear living, or dying, in unrelieved
pain" because of modern pain management methods. The patients might be
suffering from inadequately treated pain and unrecognized depression, the
brief states.

The case may finally turn on such legalistic questions as whether the
state has "standing" to seek an injunction in the first place; federal
lawyers say it does not because it will suffer no personal injury under
Ashcroft's directive.

--
The Pro-Life Infonet is a daily compilation of pro-life news and
information. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe" to:
infonet-request@prolifeinfo.org. Infonet is sponsored by Women and
Children First (http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.org). For more pro-life
info visit http://www.prolifeinfo.org and for questions or additional
information email ertelt@prolifeinfo.org




David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    11/27/2001 7:45 am  
To:  ALL   (4 of 16)  
 
  270.4 in reply to 270.1  
 
Appeals Court Affirms Kevorkian's Murder Conviction

Kevorkian had told ``60 Minutes'' he hoped to push prosecutors to act.
``They must charge me. Because if they do not, that means they don't think
it was a crime,'' he said. ``They don't need any more evidence, do they?''

Lansing, MI -- A Michigan appeals court has upheld the murder conviction
of Jack Kevorkian in the death of a 52-year-old man whose suicide was
televised on ``60 Minutes.''

In the decision, handed down Tuesday and announced Wednesday, the Michigan
Court of Appeals rejected Kevorkian's argument that euthanasia is legal
and that his conviction was unconstitutional. Kevorkian attorney Mayer
Morganroth said he will appeal to the Michigan Supreme Court and the
federal courts if necessary.

``Euthanasia is at the core of this case,'' the judges wrote.``But for
defendant's self-described zealotry, Thomas Youk's death would, in all
probability, not have been the subject of national attention, much less a
murder trial. Defendant, in what is now apparently something of
anafterthought, asks us to conclude that euthanasia is legal and,
therefore, to reverse his conviction on constitutional grounds. We refuse.
Such a holding would be the first step down a very steep and slippery
slope.''

The court also tossed out Kevorkian's argument that euthanasia involves a
dying person's "right to privacy."

``We can find no meaningful precedent for expanding the right toprivacy to
include the right to commit euthanasia so that anindividual can be free
from intolerable and irremediablesuffering,'' it wrote. The ruling was
handed down by Court of Appeals Judges William Whitbeck, Joel Hoekstra and
Henry William Saad.

Kevorkian, who says he has assisted in more than 130 suicides, is serving
a 10- to 25-year sentence in the 1998 death of Thomas Youk, who was
terminally ill with Lou Gehrig's disease.

Kevorkian had videotaped himself injecting Youk with a lethal dose of
potassium chloride and gave the tape to ``60 Minutes.'' It was televised
two months later, and prosecutors quickly filed a murder charge.

Kevorkian was convicted of second-degree murder in 1999. Acting as his own
attorney for most of the trial, he said his actions were ``a medical
service for an agonized human being.''

``The trial that he had was not a fair trial,'' Morganroth said then. ``I
don't think (his conviction) would have occurred had hehad effective
counsel.''

However, Oakland County assistant prosecutor Anica Letica argued atthe
time that Kevorkian ``knew exactly what he was doing'' when herepresented
himself with attorney David Gorosh advising him.

Kevorkian had told ``60 Minutes'' he hoped to push prosecutors to act.
``They must charge me. Because if they do not, that means they don't think
it was a crime,'' he said. ``They don't need any more evidence, do they?''

--
The Pro-Life Infonet is a daily compilation of pro-life news and
information. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe" to:
infonet-request@prolifeinfo.org. Infonet is sponsored by Women and
Children First (http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.org). For more pro-life
info visit http://www.prolifeinfo.org and for questions or additional
information email ertelt@prolifeinfo.org




David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    11/27/2001 8:08 am  
To:  ALL   (5 of 16)  
 
  270.5 in reply to 270.4  
 
Pro-Assisted Suicide Group to Campaign Against Ashcroft Order

The Hemlock Society has only 27,000 members nationwide.

Washington, DC -- The Hemlock Society, a group pushing laws legalizing
assisted suicide, said Wednesday it will launch a national campaign urging
President Bush to block a federal order undercutting assisted suicide in
Oregon.

"If this ruling were to take effect, every physician would have to factor
in what would happen if their patient died, and whether the Drug
Enforcement Agency would come knocking," said Ryan Ross, spokesman for the
Denver-based organization.

However, medical experts and public officials dispute Ross' claim. Doctors
are free to prescribe pain relief to patients as necessary so long as
their intent is to relieve pain rather than to overdose a patient and
cause death.

Attorney General John Ashcroft issued a directive earlier this month that
prohibited doctors from prescribing lethal doses of federally controlled
drugs to terminally ill patients. Ashcroft said doctors who use the drugs
to help patients die, as rmitted under the Oregon law, face suspension or
revocation of their licenses to prescribe those drugs.

Hemlock has written letters to the House and Senate judiciary committees,
purchased newspaper ads and created an online petition asking Bush to
rescind the order.

A federal judge temporarily blocked Ashcroft's order, which was hailed by
many pro-life groups as much-needed action to stop needless deaths.

The Hemlock Society has only 27,000 members nationwide.

--
For more information on assisted suicide, see the Euthanasia section of
http://www.prolifeinfo.org



David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    11/27/2001 8:10 am  
To:  ALL   (6 of 16)  
 
  270.6 in reply to 270.4  
 
Former VA Hospital Nurse Charged in Euthanasia Murder

West Palm Beach, FL -- A former nurse at a Veterans Affairs hospital was
charged with second-degree murder in the euthanasia death of a patient.

James Mullins, 56, was charged Friday and accused of killing Gary Baker,
53, by injecting him with propofol, a strong sedative that can slow or
stop respiration.

Baker, of West Palm Beach, had checked into the hospital on Feb. 5 with
back pain. He went into a coma on Feb. 10 and died 12 days later.

According to court records, Mullins resigned two weeks after Baker's
death, applied for disability benefits and began seeing a psychiatrist.
Authorities say he suffers from depression and post traumatic stress
disorder from his combat duty in Vietnam.

During an April session with the psychiatrist, Mullins had a loaded pistol
in a holster but handed it to a doctor, saying he had forgotten to check
it at the door.

He was convicted on a weapons charge last month and sentenced to six
months in prison. He already had spent five months in jail and the murder
charge came just days before his scheduled release.

--
Pregnancy Centers Online
http://www.pregnancycenters.org

 



David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    2/19/2002 10:20 pm  
To:  ALL   (7 of 16)  
 
  270.7 in reply to 270.1  
 
Subject:   Medical Journal Reveals Doctors Not Truthful to Dying Patients
Source:   American Journal of Hospice & Palliative Care; January 11, 2002

Medical Journal Reveals Doctors Not Truthful to Dying Patients

Weston, MA -- According to an article in the current issue of the American
Journal of Hospice & Palliative Care by Matt Stolick, PhD, physicians,
generally speaking, lie to dying patients, resulting in the patient not
knowing that he or she will die until the last 30 days or so.  In order to
better understand how to be truthful in caring for dying patients, medical
students should receive training in palliative and hospice care as part of
their medical education, either as volunteers or staff members.

According to the author, "Even though dying patients may not have any
reasonable chance of being cured of their terminal illnesses, they can
still benefit from medical treatment ... To recognize the dying process is
a part of the art of medicine." Compassionate care for dying patients
includes a move from curative care to pain control as the primary goal.
Palliative training (pain control) is sufficient to develop these skills
by hospice volunteer training and practice. "The time has come for
incorporating palliative care into the curriculum of medical school."

Stolick states that physicians have a duty to show "appropriate reverence"
for the dying process by "explicitly and compassionately informing the
patient that he or she is in the process of dying; and initiating a
discussion of the patient's own understanding of his or her (impending)
death."

The article by Stolick should be required reading by every medical
student.

American Journal of Hospice & Palliative Care, founded in 1984, is the
oldest and most respected peer-reviewed, multidisciplinary, professional
journal devoted exclusively to hospice care, palliative medicine and
nursing, and end-of-life care.

--
You can help women make positive, life-affirming choices when confronting
an unexpected pregnancy. Please provide a link on your web site to
Pregnancy Centers Online at http://www.pregnancycenters.org


--------------------
From:  The Pro-Life Infonet infonet@prolifeinfo.org
Reply-To:  Steven Ertelt infonet@prolifeinfo.org




David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  123four   2/20/2002 9:25 am  
To:  David (DavidABrown)    (8 of 16)  
 
  270.8 in reply to 270.7  
 
All of this thread is just so depressing. 
It's frightening to realize the depths 
of depravity that people have reached. 
Hospice is basically depriving a person 
of medical care, so that they will die 
sooner. It's a sort of game. Hospice 
care will provide various 'comfort' 
items and medicine, but shys away 
from the better antibiotics, IV 
therapies, and all such things as 
might help them recover, if even 
for a few months or years. It is 
horrible and is truly killing 
a person in the most premeditated 
way possible. It is carefully planned 
and implemented, very similar to 
an execution, only it is a slow 
execution. 
I have been told that some hospices 
will allow IVs,etc. I don't know, 
but the ones I have known about will 
not. An example, if a hospice patient 
gets pneumonia, they will listen to 
chest, and prescribe a generic 
antibiotic. Now , here they would 
know more by chest x-ray and culture 
of sputum-to be sure antibiotic is 
the correct one. They would normally 
give IV fluids with antibiotics in 
them. However, this fluid which is 
required during pneumonia to keep 
the fluid in lung more liquid and 
easier to be resorbed or coughed 
up, is not done. This causes even 
more dehydraation and deaath.
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  karen (karen10051)   2/20/2002 11:52 am  
To:  123four   (9 of 16)  
 
  270.9 in reply to 270.8  
 
Excuse me for saying this, but have you ever watched anyone die of cancer? Who says that keeping them alive that few more months by artificial means is God's will?? Another 6 months of pain when they could go peacefully now...I am sorry, but your view of Hospice is so skewed it <edited> 


 


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Edited 2/20/2002 5:30:26 PM ET by David  
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    2/20/2002 2:45 pm  
To:  123four   (10 of 16)  
 
  270.10 in reply to 270.8  
 
Hi,

 

I know it is terribly depressing and I actually try to post some of the more positive information. It can really be depressing when I go through that information for the postings but I constantly Realize the Love of Jesus that he overcame Death and that He has righted all the wrongs so gladly looking to Jesus I continue on.

 

Also it is generally known that the powers that be (Satan) and his minions (politicians), think that the world is Overpopulated although only over populated by people, there can never be enough critters but most Humans are not welcome here. So nearly every Plan has built into it a way to rid or to lessen Gods earth of people.



So for instance the whole managed health care system, abortion, tobacco, alcohol, chemicals, contaminates, pollutants, war, crime, education, entertainment.. you name it.. it is being used to lessen the population of humans.

 

In other words society Isnt messed up. Society is going exactly like the people in power want it to be and that happens to be messed up!

 

Thank God for His revealed Truth in His Bible and His Holy Spirit that they are Life and that Everlasting.

 

God Bless You,

David



David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  123four   2/20/2002 6:56 pm  
To:  David (DavidABrown)    (11 of 16)  
 
  270.11 in reply to 270.10  
 
I am glad you posted this information. 
We need to keep abreast of what is going 
on in every area. It just hurts the heart 
of Christians everywhere to see people 
killed, sometimes for the sole reason of 
being old, and nothing else. But, there 
is no respect for human life at all, 
and we want to play God to make the 
decision of even when to take the life 
of another. God tells us there is 
appointed for us a time to live , and 
a time to die. God help the person who 
takes the life of another. 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit   
Rate 
  
    
 


  From:  David (DavidABrown)    3/23/2002 4:57 pm  
To:  ALL   (12 of 16)  
 
  270.12 in reply to 270.7  
 
Source:   Focus on the Family; January 27, 2002

'Duty' to Die Emerges in Oregon

Washington, DC -- What happens when you give people the option to commit
suicide? Very quickly, the so-called "right to die" turns into a "duty to
die." Case in point: Oregon.

Oregon became the first state in the union to legalize physician-assisted
suicide in 1997. Now, a survey from Oregon contains a shocking discovery:
Sixty-eight percent of those who died by physician-assisted suicide feared
being a burden on their family.

Burke Balch, director of medical ethics for the National Right to Life
Committee, said that number is alarming.

"This is a dramatic increase over previous years, when it was about 12
percent and then about 26 percent," Balch said. "So, what we're seeing is
that over time this 'right' of assisted suicide which was sold as a matter
of personal choice becomes more and more a matter of vulnerable people
thinking that they have a 'duty to die' and get out of the way."

He continued: "This is the sort of culture of death, the sort of lack of
caring that is manifesting itself in accepting death as a solution to
human problems."

Rita Marker, who heads the International Anti-Euthanasia Task Force, said
while proponents of assisted-suicide laws claim to be offering a "choice,"
they're really leaving the aged and infirm with an obligation.

"Then you have someone who merely offers the option of saying, 'Well, you
know you could get this prescription. You could get help,' " Marker said.
"And that 'help' is in the form of a deadly overdose of drugs. Well, then
there's the question of 'Would that be better for everybody else?"

And that's not a "choice" anyone should have to make.

--
The Pro-Life Infonet is a daily compilation of pro-life news and
information. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe" to:
infonet-request@prolifeinfo.org. Infonet is sponsored by Women and
Children First (http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.org). For more pro-life
info visit http://www.prolifeinfo.org and for questions or additional
information email ertelt@prolifeinfo.org



David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit  
 
From:  David (DavidABrown)    3/23/2002 4:58 pm  
To:  ALL    
 
    
 
Subject:   The Real Truth About Oregon's Assisted Suicide Law
Source:   NRL News; January 2002

The Real Truth About Oregon's Assisted Suicide Law
By Burke J. Balch, J.D.

[Pro-Life Infonet Note:  Burke Balche is the Director of the Department of
Medical Ethics at National Right to Life and a leading national expert on
the issues of euthanasia and assisted suicide.]


A New Year's Day article appearing in the Washington Post provides an
insightful glance into the themes pro-death forces are using to deflect
mounting criticism of Oregon's unique-in-the- nation law that legalizes
lethal prescriptions to assist suicide.

The nearly three-page long article praising Oregon's law, written by the
Post's Susan Okie, is set against the backdrop of a fierce legal battle
being fought in the courts. In a November 6 letter sent to the Drug
Enforcement Agency, Attorney General John Ashcroft effectively reversed a
1998 decision by then-Attorney General Janet Reno that prohibited the DEA
from enforcing federal drug control laws against doctors who prescribed
lethal dosages under cover of Oregon's assisted suicide law.

The state of Oregon, along with the pro-euthanasia organization Compassion
in Dying, immediately appealed to U.S. District Judge Robert Jones. On
November 20, Jones allowed Oregon's law to remain in effect while he
reviews legal briefs from all parties and sorts out the legal issues. NRLC
and Oregon RTL filed a " friend-of-the-court brief" which defended
Ashcroft's legal reasoning.

According to public opinion polls, sympathy for legalizing assisted
suicide is strongest if a patient is suffering untreatable pain. However,
modern medicine's ability to control pain is so effective that current
pain was not given as a reason by any of those who received legal lethal
prescriptions in 2000, the most recent year for which official reports in
Oregon are available.

So physician-assisted suicide is now being sold, even more than ever, as a
way of asserting control--as an exercise of "autonomy."

"Among people in Oregon who have used the law to end their lives, it
appears the most common motive was a desire for autonomy," according to
the Post. "Knowing that assisted suicide is an option... seems to comfort
some sick people by offering a measure of personal choice ...."

Okie used Richard Holmes, who has received but not yet taken a lethal
prescription to make her argument. Holmes' told the Post, " I've lived my
life the way I want to. I should die the way I want to." Indeed, Holmes
believes this should be the law "in every state in the whole country."

The idea that doctor-aided suicide should be available, not to escape
intractable pain, but simply as a matter of personal choice, is prevalent
in the Netherlands, the European country where it has been practiced under
court protection for nearly two decades. Recently, a doctor there was
given no penalty even though convicted of giving a lethal injection to a
retired legislator. The legislator had no illness but simply expressed
himself "tired" of living. There is considerable agitation among the Dutch
to explicitly legalize assisting suicide in such cases.

Of course, to the extent heightened autonomy is claimed as a proper motive
for the Oregon law, there is no logical basis for limiting the
legalization of euthanasia to those who are terminally ill. It should
equally be made available to the college student, legally an adult, who
wants to exercise her autonomy by killing herself because she has been
dumped by her boyfriend.

Arguing that the Oregon law has not led to predicted abuses, Okie writes,
"[T]here is no evidence the law has been use to coerce elderly, poor or
depressed patients...." In fact, the official reports show that those
seeking lethal prescriptions have increasingly expressed concern about
becoming a burden to family, friends, or caregivers.

In 1998, 12% described that motivation; in 1999, the proportion had risen
to 26%; and in 2000, a whopping 63% said they were motivated at least in
part by fear of being a burden.

This finding is consistent with the stated objectives of the founder of
the pro-euthanasia Hemlock Society, Derek Humphry. In a 1998 book Humphry
wrote supportively of the use of assisted suicide as "one measure of cost
containment."

"[T]he elderly," Humphry said, are "putting a strain on the health care
system that will only increase and cannot be sustained."

Referring to people with disabilities, he wrote, "People with chronic
conditions account for a disproportionately large share of health care
use, both services and supplies." In light of all this, he asked, "Is
there a duty to diea responsibility within the family unit--that should
remain voluntary but expected nevertheless?"

Apparently a good number of those Oregonians seeking lethal prescriptions
are in fact motivated to do their "duty."

A major thrust of Okie's effort to justify the Oregon law is her claim
that the legalization of assisting suicide in that state has "prompted
doctors in the state to improve their care of the dying."

The article cites a 1999 survey showing "more than three-quarters of
Oregon physicians who had cared for at least one dying patient in the
previous year reported that they had made efforts to improve their
knowledge of pain treatment for such patients." Adds Okie, "Sixty-nine
percent said they had sought to improve their recognition of psychiatric
illnesses such as depression and 30 percent said they had increased their
hospice referrals."

Of course, many have remarked since September 11 that the terrorist attack
on our nation has caused Americans to unite, to reduce partisan bickering,
and to focus on things that are truly important, like family. Yet no one
suggests that these important positive consequences should lead us to
legalize or welcome terrorist attacks.

If promotion and legalization of euthanasia in Oregon has, in fact, played
a role in motivating doctors to improve positive alternatives to suicide,
that hardly is an argument for keeping assisting suicide legal there or
spreading the policy to other states.

Ironically, the article fails to draw any connection between this improved
care and another point it trumpets as a vindication of the Oregon law. The
Post notes that there have been 70 officially reported deaths under the
statute, and adds, " the law has not had the dire consequences that some
opponents predicted. ... [It has not] caused significant migration of
terminally ill people to Oregon."

Yet even the article unwittingly provides evidence that a lower-
than-feared number of deaths may be largely attributable to the provision
of positive alternatives.

The Post notes that according to one survey, "In 68 of 142 cases...., the
request for a [lethal] prescription prompted the doctor to take other
measures such as improving pain treatment, referring the patient to a
hospice or prescribing antidepressants. Almost half of those who receive
such interventions changed their minds."

Our objective should not be to promote assisted suicide but rather to
provide pain treatment, antidepressants, and other positive interventions
to 100% of the suicidal, not 48%and aggressively to improve those
interventions until no one, whether for fear of being a burden or other
reasons, feels a " need" to commit suicide.

--
The Pro-Life Infonet is a daily compilation of pro-life news and
information. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe" to:
infonet-request@prolifeinfo.org. Infonet is sponsored by Women and
Children First (http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.org). For more pro-life
info visit http://www.prolifeinfo.org and for questions or additional
information email ertelt@prolifeinfo.org




David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
From:  David (DavidABrown)    4/5/2002 7:04 pm  
To:  ALL   (14 of 16)  
 
  270.14 in reply to 270.12  
 
Source:   ABC News; March 21, 2002

New Poll Shows Americans Continue Opposition to Assisted Suicide

New York, NY -- While the courts are considering whether pro-life Attorney
General John Ashcroft can prohibit federally-regulated drugs from being
used in assisted suicides, an ABCNEWS/Beliefnet poll shows more Americans
oppose assisted suicide than don't.

When it's posed in broad strokes, 48 percent of Americans oppose
legalizing assisted suicide, while 40 percent support it. And when
Oregon's law allowing assisted suicide is described, opinion moves only
slightly, to an even split -- 48 percent opposed, 46 percent in favor.

A variety of factors inform these views, and religious belief is central
among them. Non-Christians and people who profess no religion
overwhelmingly support assisted suicide. But it's opposed by most
Christians, who account for eight in 10 Americans, and especially by
evangelical Christians, who oppose assisted suicide by a 2-1 margin.

Oregon has sued to block the U.S. Justice Department from taking legal
action against doctors in the state who participate in assisted suicides
by prescribing fatal drugs to terminally ill patients who request them. A
federal court ruling is expected this spring. Attorney General Ashcroft
says federally-controlled dugs, which have been used in almost all of
Oregon's assisted suicides, shouldn't be used.

The voter-approved Oregon law says patients seeking assisted suicide must
be diagnosed as having less than six months to live, get a second opinion
from another doctor, ask for fatal drugs three times and wait 15 days
before the prescription can be filled. Ninety-one people have used it to
end their lives since it took effect in October 1997.

Public opinion, however, looks to be based mainly on fundamental views of
life and death not the specifics of this law. Half the people in this poll
were asked simply if it should be legal for doctors to help terminally ill
patients commit suicide with fatal drugs. The other half were given the
Oregon details. Yet, as noted, opposition was stable, and support ticked
up only slightly in the latter version.

One change is among women -- who dislike assisted suicide more than men.
Just 34 percent of women support the general proposition of assisted
suicide; given the Oregon system this rises to 44 percent. The shift is
even bigger among Republicans, who oppose the general proposition by 61-28
percent, but oppose the Oregon system by a closer 52-41 percent.

Assisted suicide garners most support in the West the only region where
majorities favor the idea. The general proposition is backed by 53-36
percent in the West; the Oregon law, by 59-34 percent.

And there's an age gap: This poll finds support for assisted suicide
lowest among older Americans, those age 65 and up. One reason may be that
older adults are more apt to be religious -- and religious vierws play a
strong role in these views.

Nancy Valko, a leading pro-life nurse involved in end-of-life issues, says
older Americans oppose assisted suicide in greater numbers because they
are the most vulnerable to pressure to end their lives.

"While it's true that older Americans are more religious than younger age
groups," Valko explains, "this group also opposes assisted-suicide because
they are the age group most likely to be pushed over the edge."

Opposition to assisted suicide in general terms is strongest among
Catholics, Christian women and evangelical Christians. The Oregon system
engenders a little more support from the first two groups -- but not from
evangelical Christians, who remain very broadly opposed.

Non-evangelical Christians are less opposed:  They oppose doctor-assisted
suicide in general by a 15-point margin, but actually support the Oregon
system, 53-39 percent. A bit under half of Christians in this survey, 45
percent identified themselves as born-again or evangelical Christians.

Allowed allowed in Oregon by two public votes, efforts to legalize
assisted suicide in Michigan, home of Jack Kevorkian, failed badly and a
more recent proposal in Maine lost in 2000.

This ABCNEWS/Beliefnet survey was conducted by telephone March 13-17,
among a random national sample of 1,021 adults. The results have a
three-point error margin. Sampling, data collection and tabulation was
conducted by TNS Intersearch of Horsham, Pa.

--
The Pro-Life Infonet is a daily compilation of pro-life news and
information. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe" to:
infonet-request@prolifeinfo.org. Infonet is sponsored by Women and
Children First (http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.org). For more pro-life
info visit http://www.prolifeinfo.org and for questions or additional
information email ertelt@prolifeinfo.org



David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
  
   Options  Reply Delete Edit  
From:  David (DavidABrown)    5/29/2002 9:31 am  
To:  ALL    
 
    
 
From:  The Pro-Life Infonet www.prolifeinfo.org
Reply-To:  Steven Ertelt infonet@prolifeinfo.org
Subject:   Assisted Suicide Activist Had No Cancer At Time Of Death
Source:   Cybercast News Service; May 28, 2002

Assisted Suicide Activist Had No Cancer At Time Of Death

Sydney, Australia -- Euthanasia advocates in Australia are under fire
after a post mortem conducted on an assisted-suicide advocate showed no
traces of the bowel cancer that supposedly caused her so much suffering.

Not only did Nancy Crick's body show no signs of cancer at the time of her
death, but Australia's leading euthanasia campaigner, Philip Nitschke,
displayed no apparent surprise at learning about it.

Politicians and pro-life advocates have attacked the campaigners
credibility, and police have impounded Crick's medical records as part of
an ongoing investigation into what they are treating as a suspicious
death.

Crick, 69, killed herself on May 22 with a powerful barbiturate,
surrounded by 21 friends and supporters, after recording on an Internet
website her last months and her intention to kill herself at an
undisclosed time.

Their attendance at her bedside was intended to challenge laws which make
anyone present at a suicide liable for prosecution for assisting, on the
grounds that being there provides the person with psychological support.

Exit Australia, Nitschke's euthanasia lobby group overseeing the "Nancy
Crick project," said in statements over recent months that Crick was
"terminally ill" or was suffering from "terminal bowel cancer." On her
website, Crick wrote about the effects of the cancer -- terrible pain,
nausea, diarrhea -- and said her weight had plummeted from 65 kilograms to
27.

But now it emerges that despite the symptoms, the bowel cancer she had
been diagnosed as having earlier may not have returned at all after she
underwent surgery to remove it.

Citing sources at the coroner's office, a newspaper in Crick's Queensland
state reported at the weekend that she had no trace of bowel cancer at the
time of her death.

The Queensland police said in a statement later that the post mortem
results had been "inconclusive."

"Police will await the results of toxicology tests [on organs removed from
the body] before determining the course of the investigation," it said,
adding that the results could take up to six weeks.

The police have refused any further comment on Crick's condition, but
confirmed their investigation will now focus on interviews with the 21
witnesses.

One matter likely to be probed is the 11-hour delay between the time of
death and the time police were notified.

Nitschke, at the forefront of efforts to legalize euthanasia in Australia,
was a key figure in Crick's suicide plans, and spent considerable time
with her. He was intentionally not present when she died.

But when asked about her condition, he said the point wasn't whether
Crick's cancer had returned after several rounds of previous surgery, but
what quality of life she was experiencing. Despite having given palliative
care a chance, he said, Crick had still chosen to take her own life
because of the supposed degree of suffering.

Exit spokesman John Edge said Tuesday Crick had never led him to believe
she didn't have cancer. Nonetheless, he said, he did not think disclosure
of that fact would harm the euthanasia cause.

The point was "an academic one," because the euthanasia campaigners wanted
euthanasia to be legalized for the "hopelessly ill, not terminally ill."

Edge, the only one of the 21 witnesses to Crick's suicide whose identity
is public knowledge, said he was under legal instructions not to comment
further. He said he has had a "conversation" with police since the death.

According to legal advice taken by Exit, prosecution for those present is
a possibility. "Assisting" a suicide can carry a life sentence in
Queensland state.

In a bid to challenge the law and muddy the waters of any investigation,
Exit earlier said it was important that many people were with Crick when
she died, as this would make chances of prosecution less likely.

Right-to-Life Australia has called for a full inquiry into the Crick
affair, saying it highlighted the dangers of euthanasia.

Queensland premier, Peter Beattie, said the pro-euthanasia lobby's
credibility had been called into question, and accused Nitschke of
"masquerading" about Crick's true condition.

Beattie said Nitschke appeared to be more interested in promoting his
cause that the woman's welfare.

Also questioning Nitschke was Brian Harradine, a pro-life Senator, who
called on police to investigate the campaigner's role in Crick's death.

"It is clear that Mrs Crick and her family relied heavily on Nitschke's
advice," he said.

Nitschke is no stranger to controversy. In the 1990s he championed
legislation allowing assisted suicide in Australia's Northern Territory,
and then helped four people to kill themselves before the short-lived law
was repealed by the federal government.

Despite the debate over Crick's condition, he was not lying low Monday.
Instead he addressed a conference of Australia's leading medical
association in Canberra, where he promoted a resolution proposing that
doctors adopt a neutral stance toward terminally-ill patients wanting to
kill themselves.

The motion was defeated, but the 79-34 signaled growing support for a more
permissive approach to euthanasia.

The Australian Medical Association gathering did pass another motion,
65-48, expressing support for doctors whose "primary intent is to relieve
the suffering and distress of terminally ill patients in accordance with
patients' wishes and interests, even though a foreseen secondary
consequence is the hastening of death."

And in another Australian city, a 54-year old woman who says she has motor
neurone disease (also known as ALS) told a television program she plans to
kill herself next month.

Sandy Williamson of Melbourne urged the federal government to institute
nationwide euthanasia laws.

--
The Pro-Life Infonet is a daily compilation of pro-life news and
information. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe" to:
infonet-request@prolifeinfo.org. Infonet is sponsored by Women and
Children First http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.org For more pro-life
info visit http://www.prolifeinfo.org and for questions or additional
information email ertelt@prolifeinfo.org

 



David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
From:  David (DavidABrown)    8/1/2002 3:35 pm  
To:  ALL    
 
    
 
From:  The Pro-Life Infonet www.prolifeinfo.org
Reply-To:  Steven Ertelt infonet@prolifeinfo.org
Subject:  Eugenics Records on Forced Sterilizations Shredded in Oregon 
Source:   Portland Oregonian; July 30, 2002

Eugenics Records on Forced Sterilizations Shredded in Oregon

victims never knew what happened to them.
records have disappeared nationwide
"If we lose this information, we could rewrite our own history."

Portland, OR -- Records chronicling the forced sterilization of 2,650
Oregonians have disappeared or been shredded, erasing proof of one of the
state's most troubling chapters that advocates now want addressed.

Extensive searches for the records of the Board of Eugenics and its
successor, the Board of Social Protection, have so far turned up little
beyond annual two-page reports issued before 1950.

That's because the records were shredded at the request of a state employee
-- whose identity remains a mystery -- and in violation of state law.

"We destroyed them," said John Murphy, president of the nonprofit Portland
Habilitation Center, which held the state contract to shred the records. "I
remember them very clearly. We had to decide ethically because we had an
obligation to destroy them, but we were thinking, 'Someday these could be
the evidence of an atrocity.' "

Employees at the 50-year-old firm are combing their files for the order
that accompanied the shipment about a decade ago. Murphy thinks the files
came from Dammasch State Hospital in Wilsonville, which closed in 1995. But
two former Dammasch superintendents said they do not remember seeing the
eugenics records or ordering their destruction.

Oregon State Archives and state library employees, shocked at the potential
loss, want to find that order, too. Under state law, the state archivist
decides what records can be destroyed and when.

Unauthorized destruction of state records is a misdemeanor.

"They didn't have authorization to throw those records away. Nobody here
would have ever scheduled those things for destruction," said Mary Beth
Herkert, who manages the archives records center.

Without a record, the history of what happened depends on the memory of
those who were there. Former members of the Board of Eugenics, chiefly the
superintendents of state institutions who met quarterly, have hazy or
incomplete recollections.

"This was 40 years ago," said Dr. Dean Brooks, former superintendent of the
Oregon State Hospital. He remembers a handful of people being sterilized.
But one existing record shows that 26 people from his institution were
sterilized in a two-year period.

The records' disappearance comes as survivors and 17 organizations
representing people with disabilities, mental illness and gays want Gov.
John Kitzhaber to apologize for the state's eugenics law.

As a legislator, Kitzhaber served on the joint committee that helped repeal
the law in 1983. But advocates want him to acknowledge the state's
sterilization policies that for years were used to prevent "defectives" from
having children. They included anyone considered "feebleminded, insane,
epileptic, a habitual criminal or sexual pervert who is likely to become a
menace to society," as well as people convicted of rape or sodomy.

After 1967, when the eugenics board was revamped into the Board of Social
Protection, the law was chiefly used to sterilize those with mental illness
or mental disability.

On Monday, state employees, acting at The Oregonian's request, completed a
fruitless search of the Oregon State Hospital basement in Salem as student
archivists scrutinized microfilm of board minutes from prior to 1963.
Missing are case files, consent forms and any record of the last 20 years'
work of the Board of Eugenics and Board of Social Protection.

No trace remains of two cases that reached the Oregon Court of Appeals in
the early 1970s, including one that the U.S. Supreme Court later declined
to hear.

Murphy and his employees remember shredding the records from the state
mental health division because the contents were so disturbing. Inside
"nicely bound volumes," Murphy said, were the analysis, discussion and
conclusion of board members who referred to people in the medical terms of
the time: idiots, mongoloids and cretins.

"All the playground insults you've ever heard in your life seemed to be the
categories that they put people in," Murphy said. "Every ugly term you can
think of for human beings. . . . This wasn't a book or two. This was a
bunch of stuff."

The memory sticks with Murphy for another reason. Portland Habilitation
Center is one of the state's largest employers of people with disabilities
and mental illness.

"The very people who at one time would have been put in harm's way by the
board, instead made a living wage shredding the remnants of its work," said
Peter Bragdon, senior counsel for Columbia Sportswear Co. and a former
member of the Portland Habilitation Center board.

Murphy said his staff assumed that the documents, like the canceled checks
and other records they routinely handle, had been microfilmed. But no such
microfilm has been found.

Some documentation does exist, in patient medical records from Fairview
Hospital and other institutions. Those records include dates of
sterilization procedures and medical notes such as the laboratory analysis
of tissue. But the rationale for the sterilizations does not appear. Many
victims never knew what happened to them.

James Taves, a state employee who co-wrote the legislation repealing
Oregon's eugenics law in 1983, remembers that while researching the law, he
saw records of operations on 9- and 11-year-old girls for "hygienic
reasons."

Some families placed relatives in Fairview Hospital and Training Center for
only as long as needed for them to be sterilized. The institution, which
reported sterilizing more than half the people being discharged for several
years, curtailed such procedures in the early 1970s. Authorities attributed
the change to the growing human rights movement.

But the change at Fairview also coincided with the death of Elonda
Murchison, 29, who died while recovering from a hysterectomy, according to
a 1975 report by Willamette Week.

Jon Cooper, who oversaw the closure of Fairview in 2000 and has worked to
preserve some of that institution's history, said people in his field
routinely ditched unsavory history as public opinion changed. Someone
looking for evidence that physical restraints were used at Fairview, for
instance, would have had a hard time finding any in 1987, even though 10
years earlier there had been many.

"When it became politically incorrect to have them there, they just
disappeared," Cooper said.

One of the chief legal and historical experts of eugenics said records have
disappeared nationwide. Paul Lombardo, a University of Virginia law
professor and historian whose research has driven much of the eugenics
discussion nationwide, said the destruction of such records represents "the
worst kind of bureaucratic negligence."

"Now there is no evidence that would allow government to reflect and say,
'We did this' or for people to look at it and learn from it, or for the
people involved to make the case they've been harmed or even document the
fact it happened," Lombardo said.

"It's a tragedy and a terrible way to conduct public policy."

In the hushed halls of the Oregon State Library, librarian Merrialyce
Blanchard oversees a eugenics collection that includes more than 80 items,
only a single page of which records what happened in Oregon.

Blanchard, who said she has gone out of her way to preserve and protect the
collection, is disturbed by news of the records' destruction.

"If we lose this information, we could rewrite our own history."

--
The Pro-Life Infonet is a daily compilation of pro-life news and
information. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe" to:
infonet-request@prolifeinfo.org. Infonet is sponsored by Women and
Children First (http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.org). For more pro-life
info visit http://www.prolifeinfo.org and for questions or additional
information email ertelt@prolifeinfo.org




David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
