“…The question that we have to ask is: have we really become a society that says that the best answer that we can provide and the best that we can do for those in suffering in end-of-life situations is to help them to kill themselves? Is that really the best that we can offer? That sounds to me to be a desperately cold and soulless society, and I think that, in Scotland today, we are better than that”
“I come to this debate as a liberal and as a humanist. As a liberal, I seek always to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community. As a humanist, I try to resolve ethical issues through reason, reflection and empathy …”
“I do not accept that there is a right to die. Patrick Harvie has acknowledged that autonomy is not absolute—we are not entitled to exercise freedom that undermines or endangers the freedom of others. There is a reciprocal principle that operates; we need to have choice with responsibility.”
“…in vulnerable people’s minds, the right to die will become a duty to die. If we value the principles of equality and community as well as that of autonomy, it seems to me that the state must not sanction assisted suicide.”
“In elevating the status of individual autonomy, we reduce the status of those who are dependent. Allowing assisted suicide would, over time, change the way we view and treat the elderly, the disabled and the infirm.”
“It is often argued that the option of euthanasia will keep patients from attempting suicide… The opposite seems to be the case: the suicide rates in the Netherlands are the fastest growing when compared to surrounding European countries, most of which lack the option of euthanasia.”
Suicides increased by
between 2007 and 2016, whilst euthanasia deaths increased from1.3% of deaths in 2002 to 4.06% in 2016.
The suicide rates in most neighbouring countries are going down.
The suicide rate increased by
in a ten year period from 2009 to 2019
The suicide rate in 2019 was
than the US national average. The suicide rate in Oregon has increased by 33% between 2001 and 2019.
The suicide rate increased by
in a ten year period from 2009 to 2017.
Montana has the fourth highest suicide rate among all the US states.
Care Not Killing was set up in 2006 as an alliance of individuals and organisations which brings together disability and human rights groups, healthcare providers, and faith-based bodies, with the aims of promoting more and better palliative care; ensuring that existing laws against euthanasia and assisted suicide are not weakened or repealed; and helping the public to understand the consequences of any further weakening of the law.
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