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Assisted suicide should be allowed says Brighton

2:30pm Monday 22nd February 2010 in


Terminally ill and elderly patients suffering unbearable pain should be allowed a to commit suicide with the help of their doctor, people in Brighton and Hove believe.

A poll of the city's residents found the overwhelming majority agreed in assisted suicide, where terminally ill patients were expected to die in less than six months.

A poll conducted by Kindle found 76% of 1,000 city residents agreed doctors should be able to help a dying patient in pain to end their life.

Most residents also agreed elderly people suffering from serious, but not terminal health problems should also be allowed help dying if it was what they wanted.

When asked if “a mentally competent adult should be legally allowed to receive a doctor's assistance to die if they are very elderly and suffering unbearably from a variety of serious health problems that they will not die from and it is their persistent request”, 35% said they strongly agreed and 32% said they tended to agree.

The survey also found that half of residents had never heard of a living will, which tells doctors the medical treatment they would like to receive if they could no longer communicate. Less than one in ten people already had a living will.

Comments(9)

Dixonian says...
2:42pm Mon 22 Feb 10

That's hardly any surprise as we do have the highest suicide rate in country. Personally, I think the whole thing's a legislatory nightmare.

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Tammy Flugh says...
2:47pm Mon 22 Feb 10

Put them in Sussex police cells. Problem solved.

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Mr Pickwick says...
2:57pm Mon 22 Feb 10

One of the problems with this sort of thing is that many ill people want to die or say they want to die but a few weeks later change their minds. As an example, a friend of mine was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given a life expectancy of two years. About six months after the diagnosis, she became very depressed and wanted to commit suicide. However, three months after that, she came out of depression and got on with what life she had left, often in pain, often guilty that she was a burden on her husband and family but determined to enjoy herself. She lived another four-and-a-half years and in doing so, brought great joy to those she knew and loved. Had "assisted suicide" been available, she'd have taken it early on.
Many doctors will ease people out of suffering, if they know the patient well, so let's leave the law as it is and not look too closely if someone in great pain and despair leaves this world a few days or weeks early. But let's not encourage people to go before they are ready.

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Gaz the great says...
3:35pm Mon 22 Feb 10

250,000 residents, 1000 people asked. Not sure this is an acurate overall figure.

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Kindle says...
4:13pm Mon 22 Feb 10

To be clear about the number of interviews...the main critieria in accuracy is not the total number but how the interviewees have been selected. If they are representative a sample of 1000 will be accurate to within a couple of per cent.

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Don Pedro says...
4:38pm Mon 22 Feb 10

This debate is one that is full of highly complex issues and requires much fuller answers than a simple 'yes' or 'no' to it. Anyone who is in favour of this would surely wish to be clear that many protections were in place to protect the weak and vulnerable from being pressured into decisions they did not really want to make and at this point we come up against a whole raft of issues for which legislation would be difficultto implement. Also, was the survey asking a question such as ‘Should we improve the provision of palliative care in the UK,’ so that people can live on without suffering in intense pain? 'Assisted suicide should be allowed says Brighton' is a very crude headline and the Argus would have done well to have avoided it..

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Txa says...
4:44pm Mon 22 Feb 10

See for yourselves how well euthanasia is working in the Netherlands http://www.hospicepa
tients.org/euth-expe
rts-speak.html

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Norma Snockers says...
5:31pm Mon 22 Feb 10

Wish people would just shut up about this. My experience with several terminally ill friends and and family members is that doctors almost always do their duty by patients in extremis and tip them over the edge. All this gassing just makes it high risk for doctors.

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jon s says...
10:19pm Mon 22 Feb 10

Most people are in favour of capital punishment as well.So,that's criminals an the terminally ill we want to put down without recrimination.Can anyone think of any other group that needs culled?I'll start the ball rolling with solicitors.

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