Montana has not legalized assisted suicide

http://billingsgazette.com/news/opinion/mailbag/montana-has-not-legalized-assisted-suicide/article_758a6b1d-dc3d-5488-9750-a13b37d7d1ef.html

December 02, 2012 12:00 am

 

A recent AP article which appeared Nov. 16 in most major newspapers in our state incorrectly stated that Montana is the third state to allow assisted suicide, along with Washington and Oregon. Attorneys Greg Jackson and Matt Bowman did an extensive analysis of the case and concluded it "did not legalize assisted suicide and it continues to carry both criminal and civil liability for any doctor, institution, or lay person involved." The Montana Lawyer, the official publication of the Montana State Bar concluded the issue is open to argument, confirming that the Legislature needs to clarify the issue this coming session.

Your readership needs to know that there are problems inherent in passing a law that would allow a physician to kill their patient. People need to understand that we are talking about a physician writing a prescription for the express purpose of one taking their own life. The very oath that physicians take in stepping into this profession states that they "shall do no harm." Their purpose is to cure, to heal, to provide comfort and care at the end of life, but not to aid in facilitating the end of that life through active means. Physicians are fallible human beings and often are wrong in their prognosis concerning how long a patient will survive their illness. Often, it is depression that prompts one to think that life is not worth living or perhaps the feeling that because of their illness they are a burden to their family. The whole matter is a recipe for elder abuse.

I appreciate the opportunity to set the record straight and hope that The Gazette will continue to report on this vital topic.

David W Hafer, DDS, MS
Dayton

Assisted suicide may not bring peace to either terminally ill or their families

http://www.ravallirepublic.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_68d5ea27-25d1-5654-b61e-ca2c67d0c68d.html?print=true&cid=print

 

November 30, 2012 6:15 am  

 

This letter is a follow up to your recent (Nov. 16) article on assisted suicide and the Montana Medical Board.

 

A study was recently released in Switzerland, where assisted suicide is legal (“Death by request in Switzerland: Posttraumatic stress disorder and complicated grief after witnessing assisted suicide,” B. Wagner, J. Muller, A. Maercker; European Psychiatry 27 (2012) 542-546, available at http://choiceisanillusion.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/family-members-traumatized-eur-psych-2012.pdf). The study found that 1 out of 5 family members or friends present at an assisted suicide were traumatized. These persons “experienced full or sub-threshold (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) related to the loss of a close person through assisted suicide.”

This study is consistent with what I have observed with my law practice clients whose parents participated in the Washington/Oregon death with dignity acts (assisted suicide). With one client, one branch of the family wanted the parent to use the lethal dose, while the other did not. The parent spent much of his final days traumatized and struggling over the decision of whether or not to kill himself. This was instead of making the best of the time that he had left. My client was also traumatized. In that case, the parent did not use assisted suicide and died a natural death.

With another case, it’s unclear that the parent’s assisted-suicide death was voluntary. My client lives with that memory.

Legal assisted suicide is sold as a peaceful and loving death. It may be anything but.

Margaret Dore, Seattle WA

Senator Jim Shockley: Assisted suicide not legal

http://www.ravallirepublic.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_155276c2-3c08-11e2-a232-001a4bcf887a.html

Brad Williams is correct that assisted-suicide is not legal in Montana. (Legalization could lead to abuse). The Montana Supreme Court's assisted-suicide case, Baxter v. State, limited its holding to giving doctors who assist a suicide a potential defense if those doctors are charged with homicide for the death of their patients. There are several steps that the doctor must demonstrate to perfect the defense.

Baxter did not invalidate our homicide statutes. Baxter did not overrule our case law allowing family members to sue an attending physician for negligence, malpractice, or wrongful death.

As an attorney in private practice, I did my share of wills, probates and estates. I observed that some heirs did not care as much for the elderly as they did for the elderly person's assets.

With the legalization of assisted-suicide, heirs would be encouraged to suggest, cajole or coerce older people to kill themselves, i.e., before such persons are able to change their wills, give their money to charity or simply spend it. Legal assisted suicide is a recipe for elder abuse.

Jim Shockley
Senate District 45

Legal assisted suicide Orwellian and discriminatory

http://www.ravallirepublic.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_10cd3eb4-39cb-11e2-b954-0019bb2963f4.html?print=true&cid=print

November 28, 2012
Dear Editor:

I am confused by the ongoing dispute about whether we should legalize assisted suicide in Montana. I am a medical doctor whose patients include incarcerated persons. Law enforcement, jails and prisons are mandated to monitor for signs of depression and suicidal ideation, and to identify, intervene and/or initiate treatment. We are told that our failure to do so would be a significant breach of an inmate's civil rights. Yet according to proponents of assisted suicide, patients also have a right to receive a doctor's assistance with the suicide. This makes no sense.

On the one hand, you have a group of people (prisoners) who suffer from situational depression due to their circumstances. Suicide attempts in this population are not rare. On the other hand, you have a group of people (persons diagnosed with a terminal diagnosis) who suffer from situational depression due to their circumstances. Why is one group entitled to protection and the other is not? Is it because with the second group, you call it "aid in dying" because people are dying anyway? They may not be dying anyway. Doctors diagnoses can be wrong. I have seen patients in my own practice live longer than expected. What about an older inmate? Would he be entitled to protection or a lethal dose? This all strikes me as very Orwellian and also discriminatory to people labeled terminal. I thought freedom from discrimination was a constitutional right.

I have seen suicidal people get better and rebuild lives that looked pretty grim. I do not agree that doctors or anyone else should be steering people to suicide in Montana. I hope that our legislature will clarify once and for all that assisted suicide is not legal in Montana.

Carley C. Robertson, Havre