Category: End of Life

Massachusetts Medical Society drops opposition to doctor-prescribed suicide

By Anne Fox, President Massachusetts Citizens for Life The Massachusetts Medical Society voted Saturday to drop its opposition to physicians giving lethal drugs to their patients. The resolution defines “medical aid in dying” as “the act of providing care — palliative, hospice, compassionate — to patients at the end of life.” Sounds okay but it …

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Fame if Want to Die: Obscurity if Want to Live

By Wesley J. Smith A disabled fourteen year-old girl named Jerika Bolen is being celebrated in the news. Why? Because she wants to stop medical treatment to die. From the USA Today story: Yet more than 1,000 people showed up for the party, with police and firefighters providing a motorcade. She received cards and gifts …

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A sugar coated poison pill for Victoria

Another one-sided report on euthanasia, this time in the Australian state of Victoria By Paul Russell The Legal and Social Issues Committee of the Victorian Parliament handed down its long-awaited Report into End-of-Life Choices today. It makes some valuable comments and recommendations in respect to improvement in palliative care. It acknowledges that access to palliative …

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“Futile Care” Victim Dies in Texas

By Wesley J. Smith David Christopher Dunn, whom Houston Methodist Hospital tried to deny wanted life-sustaining treatment, has died. Dunn authorized a constitutional attack on Texas’s odious futile care law. For the sake of future Chris Dunns, I hope that case is not mooted by his death and continues. Futile care permits hospitals to create …

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A Genuine Profile in Courage: Maggie Karner, RIP

By Dave Andrusko Nineteen days before she committed suicide on November 1, 2014, Brittany Maynard recorded a video demanding that California legislators endorse assisted suicide–an enormous public relations coup for Compassion & Choices. It was not the only video Mrs. Maynard recorded, however. In response to a prior video, Maggie Karner, who, like Brittany, suffered …

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Living with Cancer, Living with Grace

By Carol Tobias, President, National Right to Life Editor’s note. This note of appreciation to Maggie Karner was written last April by NRL President Carol Tobias. Mrs. Karner died last Friday. We have also included the Open Letter Dr. Karner wrote to Brittany Maynard, who, tragically, had become famous for becoming the public face of …

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Dr. Oliver Sacks: choosing to live his last few months “in the richest, deepest, most productive way I can”

By Dave Andrusko Editor’s note. One of the single most fascinating men you will ever encounter passed away yesterday at his home in Manhattan. Dr. Oliver Sacks was 82. We wrote about him last February on the occasion of an extraordinary essay he’d penned for the New York Times. In my opinion, my few comments …

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Americans do not agree with Ezekiel Emanuel who wants to die at 75

  By Dave Andrusko When you come across anything about “death and dying,” you really have to read with exceptional care. The conclusions researchers/reporters draw often are much more their own personal preferences than they are what the data are saying. Here’s an example: “Most people want to live past 75, but they haven’t given …

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Should Teenagers Plan End-of-Life Care?

  By Wesley J. Smith I think the drive to get us all talking about dying may be getting a little out of hand. A new 500 page report funded to the tune of $1.5 million by an anonymous donor–would love to know who that was–has recommended that end-of-life medical care be discussed with teenagers. …

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Ezekiel Emanuel: We Should Die at 75

  By Wesley J. Smith Ezekiel Emanuel is one of the nation’s premier Obamacarians. He has the president’s ear. He is for health care rationing. And now, he wants us to die at 75. He doesn’t put it quite like that, writing in the first person. But make no mistake: That is his essential message. …

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Advance Planning for Treatment Denial “Conversations” Spread — But What is Driving the Conversation?

  By Jennifer Popik, JD, Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics Those seeking to fund advance planning “conversations” — efforts to encourage doctors or others to talk with potential patients about whether they should receive life-saving medical treatment if incapacitated– are progressing on many fronts. Not only are there several bills pending before Congress, but …

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