I'm afraid: euthanasia. What can I do?

[HOPEFUL_IN_UK]

I find that, more and more, I worry about the future and euthanasia. I currently don’t feel much more than pity for any terminally ill person who wants to end their suffering. I know it’s despair and not right, but I don’t judge them harshly as individuals.

What does frighten me is the increasing acceptance of the idea. I’ve already seen (in online debates) a line being crossed. Inevitably, someone will post something to the effect of, “I wouldn’t want to be a burden on my loved ones…”

I was just listening to a BBC podcast about the shrinking resources for social services for people who need help bathing, dressing, cooking, etc. I know someone who does it for a living - she’s employed by the council to go by and check up on/help out people who are old or handicapped. She said it’s really hard to get in and out in the alloted time and she’ll often leave knowing that the person is desperately in need of more than she is authorized or able to give.

The diocesan newspaper here had a cover story about funding for a local hospice being cut: the story claimed that this was inching towards euthanasia. Remember, the UK has publically-funded health care that is already stretched to the max and things like a dignified natural death may come to be a “luxery.”

I believe that, with our aging population and smaller families, the time will come when euthanasia will be EXPECTED of the terminally ill and infirm. How will people feel when they realize that they can only be kept alive at the expense of their grandchild’s college education? That they can either be warehoused in an understaffed “nursing home” (where, it has been documented, many people slowly starve to death) or they can be a “burden” on their children - assuming they even have children.

What can we do about this?

What can I do about this? I’m thinking that maybe I should volunteer, somehow. I’ll be the first to admit that the thought terrifies me. I am afraid of entering the life of some infirm, incontinent, lonely, needy person. I’m afraid of getting close to that - the smells, the disturbing glimpse into their misery and loneliness, the sense of not being able to do enough. They’re not all going to be sweet old grannies. They may be downright unlikeable even as personalities, not to mention their neediness. But, I think it’s necessary? I should pray about this, I think.

 

[Mannyfit75]

Read this following article:


What About the Right to Die? by Fr. Frank Pavone

Thou shall not kill thy Spouse. by Edward Peters

 

[Ridgerunner]

Hopefully:

It can be bad in the other direction too. Lots of these nursing homes make lots of money, and the death rate has a way of following the demand for beds. Some people are kept alive long after they should be allowed to die, in order to keep the bed filled. If the demand for beds gets too great, some die. My wife, an RN who once worked in one, was once ordered to give an IV to a dead person so they could bill for it before they closed her account and called the funeral home. She squeezed it out into the trash can and quit.

I have long thought parishes and dioceses should have their own nursing homes. But there doesn’t seem to be any interest in that kind of thing.

 

[brigid12]

Look on Priests for Life website and/or ask at your parish (or surrounding parishes - call 'em) for their Respect Life committees and join one (or more?). That’s what they deal with (not only abortion concerns, although that too). They’ll be all too happy to have you help them!

 

[drafdog]

There is a difference between euthanasia and allowing a terminally ill patient to die of natural causes. The first involves some act which results in the death of another. The second is the withdrawal of life extending treatment. You stop doing something.
That being said we can get into long, involved discussions of “extraordinary means” when seeking to maintain life. A lot of people think that withholding medical treatment is wrong when it can prolong life. This fails to take into account the emotional, psychological, spiritual and financial cost to family, friends and the community at large. All of the above listed factors are part of the Church’s definition of extraordinary means and need to be considered in formulating an answer. Do we spend outrageous amounts of money to provide an organ transplant and a lifetime of anti-rejection drugs to one patient at the cost of refusing ordinary office visits and prescriptions for hundreds or thousands? No two persons will have the same reaction to these situations and Americans, without national health care, feel that as long as a patient can pay the bill, anything goes.
No discussion on this forum will solve the question, and the Church’s teaching on it is still in development.

Matthew

 

[blacktiger057]

My view on euthansia:

People should not be euthanized if they are not suffering from a deathly medical condition. However, I do support euthanizing those terminally ill and in serious pain. It is truly their free will, and if their existence has become nothing but pain and suffering, then this would be logical and I would accept their decision. My cat, Jinx, had a tumor behind her eye. It was eventually going to push her eye out of its socket, and already her eye was distorted and she was in immense pain. I could not stand to see her slowly dying like that. Euthanasia was the most merciful thing to do. Although this was an animal, similar and even more serious and painful situations are faced by some people.

Also, keeping someone alive with a deathly medical condition is extremely costly(not just moneywise)for families. They are just paying money so that someone can live, and probably suffer, for a week longer. Euthansia is the best thing to do in scenarios like this. The person is only suffering, so why pay to suffer longer?

I think the RCC actually has the same opinion about euthanasia as I do…I was really surprised that the RCC and I actually agreed on something, for once!

 

[Naztakuan]

I think you misinderstood. Keeping them alive by artificial means is not necessary. Only feeding them and giving them water and basic stuff like that. Life support is not required and if they are being kept alive via an artificial method like an iron lung or something, one is permitted to “pull the plug”. One could argue that it would have been ok to take Christpher Reave off of his life support chair theat helped him breathe since that was an extreme method of keeping him alive. Pain is a relative experience so euthanasia is not a legitimate option. The body has to be unable to work which means the person will die without extreme medical assistance.

 

[ribozyme]

I think you misinderstood. Keeping them alive by artificial means is not necessary. Only feeding them and giving them water and basic stuff like that. Life support is not required and if they are being kept alive via an artificial method like an iron lung or something, one is permitted to “pull the plug”. One could argue that it would have been ok to take Christpher Reave off of his life support chair theat helped him breathe since that was an extreme method of keeping him alive. Pain is a relative experience so euthanasia is not a legitimate option. The body has to be unable to work which means the person will die without extreme medical assistance.

I believe some extreme measures are justified if the patient agrees with them and we obliged to provide those measures if the patient wants them.

 

[Naztakuan]

it’s justified but not required. I’m not sure if it’s even obligatory or not.

 

[ribozyme]

There is a difference between euthanasia and allowing a terminally ill patient to die of natural causes. The first involves some act which results in the death of another. The second is the withdrawal of life extending treatment. You stop doing something.

For a consequentialist perspective, there isn’t much of a difference because one might argue that the interval between accelerated death and natural death is small. Besides, euthanasia might be preferred by the patient to relieve their suffering

That being said we can get into long, involved discussions of “extraordinary means” when seeking to maintain life. A lot of people think that withholding medical treatment is wrong when it can prolong life. This fails to take into account the emotional, psychological, spiritual and financial cost to family, friends and the community at large. All of the above listed factors are part of the Church’s definition of extraordinary means and need to be considered in formulating an answer. Do we spend outrageous amounts of money to provide an organ transplant and a lifetime of anti-rejection drugs to one patient at the cost of refusing ordinary office visits and prescriptions for hundreds or thousands? No two persons will have the same reaction to these situations and Americans, without national health care, feel that as long as a patient can pay the bill, anything goes.

I really dislike the question of euthanasia…Why do people ask whether it is acceptable to actively kill someone who wants to die? But, such an approach might permit apathy regarding helping someone who wants to live. Would it be considered murder to withhold (sin of omission) life-saving medicine from them? An important question is if it is wrong to actively kill someone, is it wrong to allow someone to die if action can be taken.

One might ask if it is wrong for someone to die because they lack the ability to pay for medical care.

On another related topic, I found this on the bcr-abl kinase and c-kit inhibitor imatinib and its cost effectiveness…

Newly diagnosed patients who take imatinib as their first-line therapy for chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) can expect to live on average six years longer than those who take more traditional interferon-alpha therapy, the researchers found. Based on projected costs and survival estimates, the group calculated the incremental cost of imatinib at $43,100 per life-year saved. A commonly accepted cost threshold for medical therapies in the United States is $50,000 per life-year saved.

…

The Duke team’s model estimated the expected long-term survival of patients taking imatinib based on long-term survival data from patients who achieved a complete cytogenetic response in earlier clinical trials of interferon-alpha. The analysis found that leukemia patients taking imatinib as a first-line therapy would survive for an estimated 15.3 years, compared with 9.1 years for those taking interferon-alpha – an increase of 6.2 years, on average.

After adjusting for quality of life, the patients taking imatinib gained an estimated 5.85 quality-adjusted life years, with an increase in lifetime cost of approximately $241,800, the researchers reported. The researchers estimated the undiscounted lifetime costs of imatinib at $424,600 compared to $182,800 for interferon.

After discounting costs and survival benefits that occur in the future, incremental lifetime costs were found to be $168,100 higher with imatinib, resulting in incremental cost-effectiveness ratios of $43,100 per life-year saved and $43,300 per quality-adjusted life year saved.

dukemednews.org/news/article.php?id=8336
Wow, now that is an effective treatment for an ailment! (Even better drugs such as nilotinib and dasatinib also exist now for this which was used for imatinib resistant patients.) Do you think it is wrong to withhold imatinib from CML patients? I do because it is wrong to allow people to suffer and die. I do think it is ethical to defray the costs for immunosupressants for transplant patients.

Should be euthanasize CML patients and not allow them access to drugs? I think Peter Singer, who thinks euthanasia would be ethically acceptable in some cases, would say no.

 

[ribozyme]

it’s justified but not required. I’m not sure if it’s even obligatory or not.

I think it should be morally obligatory if the patient wants them. This is consistent with Peter Singer’s preference utilitarian approach.