Delaware Assisted Suicide Euthanasia Bill: Proposed Oversight is a Sham

State House, Dover DE

To view a pdf version, click these links to view the index, memo and appendix.

I.  INTRODUCTION 

HB 160 legalizes assisted suicide and euthanasia as those terms are traditionally defined. The bill is based on a similar law in Oregon, which has a near complete lack of transparency.

If Delaware enacts HB 160 and follows Oregon practice, there will be a similar lack of transparency. The safety and welfare of individuals will be unverifiable from state sources.

Nevada: Reject SB 261 (First Reprint)

To view a pdf version, click these links for the index, memo and appendix.

The issues addressed include why proposed patient protections ("safeguards") are unenforceable. See Section IX below. 

 Margaret Dore, Esq., MBA

I.  INTRODUCTION

I am an attorney in Washington State where assisted suicide is legal. Our law is based on a similar law in Oregon.[1] Both laws are similar to SB 261, which seeks to legalize assisted suicide and euthanasia in Nevada.[2]

SB 261 is stacked against the individual and recipe for elder abuse. If enacted, the bill will encourage people with years or decades to live to throw away their lives. I urge you to reject this measure.

South Dakota Initiated Measure Stacked Against the Patient and a Recipe for Elder Abuse

By Margaret Dore, Esq., MBA

To view a pdf version of this document, click the following links: index, memo and appendix. To view a one page bullet point handout, click here.

I. INTRODUCTION

I am an attorney in Washington State where assisted suicide is legal. [1] Our law is based on a similar law in Oregon. Both laws are similar to the initiated measure, which seeks to legalize assisted suicide and euthanasia in South Dakota.[2]

The initiated measure is sold as a promotion of patient choice and control. The measure is instead stacked against the patient and a recipe for elder abuse.

If enacted, the measure will apply to people with years or decades to live. People with years or decades to live will be encouraged to throw away their lives. I urge you to reject this  measure.

Dore Memoradum and Legal Analysis Opposing Nevada Bill

By Margaret Dore. To view a pdf version, click here, here and here.

I.  INTRODUCTION

Jeanette Hall

I am an attorney in Washington State where assisted suicide  is legal.[1] Our law is based on a similar law in Oregon.  Both laws are similar to the proposed bill, SB 261.[2]

The proposed bill seeks to legalize physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia as those terms are traditionally defined.  The bill sells these practices as a promotion of self-determination.  The bill is instead stacked against the patient and a recipe for elder abuse.

The bill applies to persons with years or decades to live.  Passage will encourage people with years or decades to live to throw away their lives.  I urge you to vote “No” on SB 261.

Maine: Reject LD 347 & LD 1066

For legal analysis and back up documentation, click here and here. For a pdf handout version of this post, click here.

Highlights:

•  LD 347 & LD 1066 apply to people with years or decades to live.

• Enacting either bill will encourage people with years or decades to live to throw away their lives.

• The bills are sold as providing a voluntary patient choice, but don’t even have a requirement of  voluntariness or consent when the lethal dose is administered.

Quick Facts: District of Columbia B21-38

By Margaret Dore, Esq., MBA

Margaret Dore Esq., MBA, Councilmember
Yvette Alexander

For more information, see Memo Opposing B21-38 and attachments. See also Suicide Contagion Memo and attachments.

1.  Overview

B21-38 legalizes physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia as those terms are traditionally defined. Legally authorized participants include health care providers and family members.

2.  Definitions

Assisted suicide means that someone provides the means and/or information for another person to commit suicide. When a physician is involved,

Soyer: Who has the Choice in Assisted Suicide?

http://daily-iowan.com/2016/10/25/soyer-who-has-the-choice-in-assisted-suicide

Hannah Soyer

I am a very large supporter of individual choices and the right for individuals to make choices in regard to their own lives. Though, in the context of California’s most recent legislation concerning assisted suicide, the idea of “choice” may be disputed rather than upheld.

Stephanie Packer, a woman living in California who has a terminal form of scleroderma, an autoimmune disease, recently came out saying that her insurance company denied her coverage of chemotherapy but said it would cover doctor-assisted suicide. The insurance originally was going to cover her chemo, but then the End of Life Option Act went into effect on June 9. . .

Soon after this law was passed, Packer received a letter from her insurance company saying it was no longer going to cover her treatment, although the life-ending drugs would be covered.

Denver Post Switches Sides: Votes "NO" on Prop. 106

https://www.denverpost.com/2016/10/11/no-on-proposition-106-aid-in-dying-measure-lacks-proper-safeguards/

After a lot of soul-searching, we are asking voters to reject Proposition 106, a measure that would give patients the legal right to end their life, because we fear the cultural, legal and medical shift that it would create in Colorado.

Nancy Valko on Oregon: What hides in the dark?

"No other area of medical practice-even lethal injection-is allowed such secrecy and immunity." Nancy Valko, RN

"What hides in
 the dark?"

Edited by Margaret Dore, Esq., MBA

Note two provisions in Oregon's law:

“The Health Services shall make rules to facilitate the collection of information regarding compliance with ORS 127.800 to 127.897. Except as otherwise required by law, the information collected shall not be a public record and may not be made available for inspection by the public.” (Only an “an annual statistical report of information” is made public.) (Emphasis added.)

And 

“No person shall be subject to civil or criminal liability or professional disciplinary action for participating in good faith compliance with ORS 127.800 to 127.897. ” (Emphasis added.)

There is also no requirement that the doctor or anyone else witness or even be present at the lethal overdose.

NEW DATE! Early Warning: Enjoy an Interesting Evening In Missoula Montana

Rep. Brad Tschida

Rolling Back the Suicide Epidemic:

Why are Physician-Assisted Suicide

and Euthanasia Bad News for Montana?

THURSDAY, Oct. 13, 2016, 7 p.m.
New date!

Click here to view flyer with the new date     

Presenters:   

Senator Jennifer Fielder

• Brad Tschida, Montana State Representative, a legislative leader in the fight to prevent suicide.
• Jennifer Fielder, Montana State Senator, a legislative leader in the fight to prevent suicide.
• Philip Tummarello, retired Sgt. Inspector of the San Francisco Police Department, who implemented and supervised the San Francisco Elder Abuse Task Force.
• Margaret Dore, a lawyer in Washington State where assisted suicide and euthanasia are legal, and president of Choice is an Illusion, a nonprofit corporation. 

DC Bill: Patients Have No Right to be Told of Options for Cure or to Extend Life; Patient Choice is Not Assured

"Ejusdem generis, Latin for
"of the same kind.”

By Margaret Dore, Esq., MBA

"Ejusdem generis" is Latin for "of the same kind."[1] The phrase is also a rule of statutory construction, which is used to interpret loosely written statutes[2]. The rule states:

"Where a law lists specific classes of persons or things and then refers to them in general, the general statements only apply to the same kind of persons or things specifically listed. Example:  if a law refers to automobiles, trucks, tractors, motorcycles and other motor-powered vehicles, 'vehicles' would not include airplanes, since the list was of land-based transportation." (Emphasis added). [3]

'Death with Dignity' Imperils the Poor

Reprint from 2004

http://realchangenews.org/index.php/site/archives/9122

Last week’s article by an assisted suicide/euthanasia advocate struck me as a bizarre article  

for Real Change, which advocates for the dignity and self-determination of the poor. (“Terminally ill patients face shortage of right-to-die drug amid controversy over capital punishment,” Real Change, June 18, 2014)

Press Release: Bill Will Allow "the Perfect Crime," Encourage People "to Throw Away Their Lives"

For print version, click here.

Salt Lake City, UT -- Attorney Margaret Dore, president of Choice is an Illusion, which has fought assisted suicide legalization efforts in many states, and now Utah, made the following statement in connection with a bill pending before the Utah Legislature.  (HB 264).

"The bill has an application process to obtain the lethal dose," said Dore. "The process includes a written lethal dose request form with two required witnesses.  One of the witnesses is allowed to be the patient's heir who will financially benefit from the patient's death."

Utah: Testimony of Kenneth Stevens MD Opposing Assisted Suicide

To view testimony as a pdf, click here.

1.  I strongly urge you to Vote No on HB 264, which seeks to legalize physician assisted suicide in Utah

Photo of me and my patient Jeanette Hall, 15 years after
I talked her out of assisted suicide in Oregon
Photo credit - Daily Signal

I am a cancer doctor in Oregon, where physician-assisted suicide is legal. I was also raised in Logan, graduated from USU, and received my MD from the University of Utah Medical School 50 years ago. I am Professor Emeritus and former chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology at Oregon Health and Science University. I regularly visit Utah. I continue to practice in my cancer medical specialty.

New Mexico Supreme Court Upholds Statute Prohibiting Assisted Suicide

New Mexico Supreme Court

Today, the New Mexico Supreme Court upheld a criminal statute prohibiting "assisting suicide" as constitutional when applied to "physician aid in dying," meaning physician-assisted suicide. The 5-0 decision states in part:

[W]e agree with the legitimate concern that recognizing a right to physician aid in dying will lead to voluntary or involuntary euthanasia because if it is a right, it must be made available to everyone, even when a duly appointed surrogate makes the decision, and even when the patient is unable to self-administer the life-ending medication. . . .

[The] statute is neither unconstitutional or its face nor as it is applied to Petitioners. . . . [W]e reverse the district court's contrary conclusion and remand to the district court for proceedings consistent with this opinion. [pp. 31 & 57]

Massachusetts Assisted Suicide Bill Dies in Committee!

From Second Thoughts, Massachusetts, People with Disabilities Opposing the Legalization of Assisted Suicide:

Today, the Joint Committee on Public Health, of the Massachusetts Legislature, "declined to advance H.1999 the latest assisted suicide bill, H 1991, euphemistically titled 'An act affirming a terminally ill patient's right to compassionate aid in dying.' Disability rights advocates, along with representatives from medicine and members of the public, testified and lobbied against the bill."

The written testimony of Margaret Dore, president of Choice is an Illusion, is summarized below:

H.1991 is similar to Ballot Question 2, which was defeated by a vote of the people in 2012. This memo and its attachments discuss why H.1991 is a recipe for elder abuse. Passage will also cause family trauma, and encourage people with years to live to throw away their lives....  Even if you are for the concept of assisted suicide, H.1991 is the wrong bill.

Thank you to everyone who helped make this defeat possible!

Please consider a generous donation to Second Thoughts, Choice is an Illusion or your local group fighting against the legalization of assisted suicide and euthanasia.

We are need your support!

Choice is an Illusion

Czeck Cabinet rejects deputies' bill allowing euthanasia

http://www.praguemonitor.com/2016/06/23/cabinet-rejects-deputies-bill-allowing-euthanasia

Prague, June 22 (CTK) - The Czech centre-left cabinet rejected yesterday a deputies' bill enabling to

perform euthanasia in strictly defined cases, two ministers have written on Twitter. . . 

The final decision on it is up to parliament.

Deputy PM Pavel Belobradek (KDU-CSL) and Industry and Trade Minister Jan Mladek (CSSD) have reported on the government's negative stand on Twitter.

"The bill, if passed, could result in the killing of people," Mladek wrote.

British Medical Association Rejects Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia by 2 to 1 Majority

The British Medical Association has once again rejected assisted suicide and euthanasia. Dr. Peter Saunders of Care Not Killing provides this report on his blog:

Today the Annual Representative Meeting (ARM) of the British Medical Association (BMA) in Belfast voted against going neutral on assisted suicide by a two to one majority. . . .

British parliaments have consistently resisted any move to legalise any form of assisted suicide or euthanasia. There have been a dozen unsuccessful attempts in the last twelve years. Last year the Marris Bill in the House of Commons and the Harvie Bill in the Scottish Parliament were defeated by 330-118 and 82-36 respectively. . . .

To view Dr. Saunders' entire report, click here.

Worldwide Theater Protest: Melbourne Australia

http://thevine.com.au/entertainment/disability-activists-boycotting-hashtag-mebeforeeuthanasia/

While rom-com ‘Me Before You’ was only released in Australia today [06/15/16], it’s already receiving a growing amount of backlash. . . .

Activists . . .  argue the film promotes the notion that disabled lives are considered less valuable and that the film romanticises death. . . .

For more information about the worldwide theater protest, click here.

New York Memo Opposing Bills A. 10059 and S. 7579 - Web Version

https://choiceisanillusion.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/ny-memo-05-31-16_001.pdf

I. INTRODUCTION

I am a lawyer in Washington State where physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia are legal.[1] Our law is based on a similar law in Oregon.  Both laws are similar to the proposed bills, A. 10059 and S. 7579.[2]

The bills are titled “Medical Aid in Dying.”  There is, however, no requirement that patients be dying. “Eligible” patients may have years, even decades, to live. The bills are also sold as a promotion of patient choice and control. The bills are instead stacked against the patient and a recipe for elder abuse. Finally, the bills are deceptively written; they are not what they appear to be. I urge you to vote “No.”