California plans to drug depressed patients to death
‘Nothing in the bill prohibits this horror’

Just as Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama was in Denver preaching to a crowd of thousands of fans about the “change” he wants to see in the United States, his party compatriots in the California Legislature were making a “change,” by approving a controversial plan that would allow nurses to assist terminally ill patients with suicide.

“AB 2747 allows a physician assistant or a nurse to opine that a patient is ‘terminal,’ and then push for unnatural death by ‘palliative sedation,’” said Randy Thomasson, chief of the Campaign for Children and Families shortly after the vote.

“Depressed patients who succumb to this pressure will be drugged unconscious and die from dehydration, usually within five to 10 days. Nothing in the bill prohibits this horror,” he said.

Forty-two Democrats in California voted in favor of the plan: 30 Republicans and two Democrats opposed the plan.

The bill does not otherwise attempt to expressly define terminal illness that each of these health care professionals would have to diagnose to trigger the offer of counseling end of life options. It is not clear why nurse practitioners and physician assistants could make such a significant diagnosis. It is further not clear from the bill how making such significant diagnoses on a case-by-case basis can be done by such practitioners and assistants based on so-called ‘standardized procedures and protocols’ not further defined by the bill. The potential effect of AB 2747 is extremely broad and could cause irrevocable harm.”

Added Republican Doug La Malfa of Yuba City: “We really go down a slippery slope when we contemplate the ending of life in such a way that it could be coerced. You have people in a very precarious situation, in a very awkward situation, that when thrust upon them with options to end their life, you have people that may feel like they have no use anymore. They feel like they’re not of value anymore, and that taking one of these options, they may feel, is the only way out, that they’ve become a burden to their family or to someone else. I would hate to put people in that kind of position. They’re already feeling vulnerable, and now, confronted with ways to end your life – this is a very delicate and, I think, dangerous idea here. You could have people like heirs that are anxious to get the estate started and quietly coercing people into making decisions like this.”

“Total sedation (TS) – called by some ‘terminal sedation,’ ‘palliative sedation,’ or ‘slow euthanasia’ – is a protocol recently added to the lexicon of contemporary medical interventions and is a construct actively promulgated by the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO),” wrote Dr. Howard M. Ducharme, past chair of the philosophy department at the University of Akron. “It is defined as ‘the application of pharmacotherapy to induce a state of decreased or absent awareness (unconsciousness) in order to relieve the burden of otherwise intractable suffering. However, any quick acceptance of TS would be ill-advised because of the many ‘devils in the details.’”

First, to be honest a Nurse Practioner is not the same as a nurse as the lead paragraph suggests. Nurse Practioners and Physician’s Assistants have much more medical education and practice under the supervision of a licensed physician.

Next, the words of the bill were modified to not use the words “palliative sedation,” to make it appear much less severe, but it is worded in such a manner as to allow “palliative sedation” regardless.

Under “do no harm” and the general concept of saving lives, IMO, no medical person should ever be allowed to counsel or encourage assisted suicide, which is active euthanasia, which is state sanctioned murder.

Palliative sedation for the amelioration of severe or unbearable pain should be permitted to the point of ending the pain, even if unconsciousness and/or death occurs; and the administration of that medication (dosage and frequency) can be in direct control of the patient’s, not, I mean never medical practioners. This is done all the time after major surgery.

The withholding of nutrition and hydration is active euthanasia and like this non-physician assisted suicide is likewise state santioned murder and should, IMO, in every case not be permitted by health care professionals.

If patients are in a depressed state, whether non-physician assisted suicide is lawful or not, they are NOT qualified to give proper consent.

There are options available fo people that want to commit self-murder, but neither the state in any fashion nor any health care professinals should, IMO, ever be allowed to assist in that self-murder, as then they become accessories to murder, some directly, but all in our name and therein we have taken one more step towards eliminating social undesireables under the cloak of helping the severely despressed “off” themselves.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=73786