[Pflienews] PFLI E-News Update: Oregon Trojan Horse

[PFLI PharmAid Center]

*PharmFacts E-News Update -- 14 May 2008 AD
*


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**** 

** Humanlife.net Newsletter**

Human Life of Washington <http://www.humanlife.net>

*Oregon**'s Trojan Horse ***

/"Why hasn't Oregon expanded its law?"/

*/by Rita L. Marker/*

No matter the event, the venue or the audience  in the United States or 
in another country  assisted-suicide activists portray assisted suicide 
as the exercise of personal autonomy that is used to end unbearable 
suffering.

Conversely, opponents raise concerns that transforming assisted suicide 
from a crime into a medical treatment would eventually result in its 
expansion to include euthanasia by lethal injection and to encompass 
everyone from children to the frail, demented elderly.

Now that assisted suicide has been legally practiced in Oregon 
<http://www.internationaltaskforce.org/sptlt2.htm> for ten years, those 
who oppose assisted suicide must answer the question: "Why hasn't Oregon 
expanded its law?"

The answer is simple: Political expediency.

Expansion of Oregon's law would be counterproductive for those who have 
long sought to transform both euthanasia (by lethal injection) and 
assisted suicide (by a lethal overdose of drugs) into accepted medical 
treatments.

To understand this, let's examine a bit of background to Oregon's law.

*/Background/***

Those who are committed to widespread acceptance of euthanasia and 
assisted suicide tried for years to gain approval for their agenda. 
However, without exception, their efforts failed. Finally, after defeat 
of ballot initiatives which would have legalized euthanasia and assisted 
suicide in Washington in 1991 and California in 1992, proponents 
realized they needed to change their approach.

They settled on a step-by-step strategy. That strategy called for 
gaining approval of assisted suicide with "safeguards." Once there, they 
could begin to expand until they eventually reached their goal.

Oregon passed such a law in 1994 and, after a series of court 
challenges, it went into effect in 1997. Assisted-suicide leaders were 
certain that other states would quickly fall in line and adopt 
Oregon-style laws. But they were wrong. In the years since Oregon's law 
has been in effect, more than 20 states (multiple times, in some) have 
considered proposals that are virtually identical to Oregon's law.

Yet, each and every one of those proposals 
<http://www.internationaltaskforce.org/usa.htm> failed.

The result?

Expansion plans had to be put on hold.

After all, if other states refused to pass laws in the current, 
seemingly restrictive Oregon style, it was a sure bet that they'd be 
even less inclined to follow Oregon's lead if it were to be expanded.

Euthanasia leaders knew they had their work cut out for them if they 
were to bring other states into the fold. So, it was back to the drawing 
board.

That led to a blueprint to break the logjam. It's called "Oregon plus One."

*/Studies & Reports/***

"Oregon plus One" is a new starting point, not an end goal. It's based 
on the premise that victory in just one more state will serve as a 
catalyst to move them ahead toward their eventual goal.

To get that previously illusive win in just one more state, 
assisted-suicide organizations embarked on a massive effort to polish 
the image of Oregon's law by highlighting studies and Oregon's official 
reports.

Yet, the studies are far from un-biased and the official reports are 
questionable at best.

Take, for example, a study, published in late 2007 by the /Journal of 
Medical Ethics/. Widely reported in newspapers across the country, its 
principle author was Margaret Pabst Battin, a University of Utah 
philosophy professor. Neither the journal nor media coverage of the 
study noted Battin's longtime support for death on demand or the fact 
that she serves on the advisory board of one of the country's leading 
pro-assisted suicide advocacy groups  a group that has spent hundreds of 
thousands of dollars to promote the "Oregon plus One" plan.

In addition to such biased studies, Oregon's annual official reports 
are, like any other report, only as reliable as the data they contain. 
Yet those responsible for formulating those official reports admit that 
they have no way of knowing if the data they receive from prescribing 
doctors is accurate or complete.

Thus, the basis for the "proof"  contained in studies and reports  is as 
solid as quicksand.

*/Reasons for legalizing assisted suicide require expansion/***

Oregon's law and the proposals based on it provide that assisted suicide 
is available to terminally ill competent adults who must self-administer 
the lethal drugs. At the same time, personal autonomy and ending 
suffering are the two prime reasons given for such laws. But those 
reasons, in and of themselves, require that the practice not be limited 
to self-administration by a terminally ill, competent adult.

Consider the following:

If personal autonomy is the basis for permitting assisted suicide, why 
would a person only have personal autonomy if he has been diagnosed (or 
misdiagnosed) as having a terminal condition?

If assisted suicide is proclaimed by the force of law to be a good 
solution to the problem of human suffering then isn't it both 
unreasonable and cruel to limit it to the dying? Once we have changed 
assisted suicide from a bad thing to be prevented to, at least in some 
cases, a good thing to be facilitated, isn't it easy to see how the 
early "safeguards" could be seen as obstacles to be surmounted?

On what basis could one deny a good and compassionate medical treatment 
to those who are suffering from chronic conditions? Or from children? Or 
from those who never have been or are no longer competent?

If a lethal dose of drugs is considered a good medical treatment, isn't 
the requirement of self-administration both illogical and overly 
restrictive? What about the person who is physically unable to 
self-administer the lethal dose? After all, is there any other medical 
treatment that a physician can prescribe for, but not administer to, a 
patient?

*/Expansion predicted/***

Contrary to what some may believe, talk of expanding assisted-suicide is 
not a notion that originates with opponents of such a practice. It is 
actually the leaders of the right to die movement who have discussed 
that goal, often openly. For example, in his 1991 book, /Final Exit,/ 
Derek Humphry, the cofounder of the Hemlock Society (now known as 
Compassion & Choices), explained that restrictive laws would eventually 
encompass people with disabilities. Humphry wrote, "when we have 
statutes on the books permitting lawful physician aid-in-dying for the 
terminally ill, I believe that along with this reform there will come a 
more tolerant attitude to the other exceptional cases."

In a December 2007 cover story, the /New York Times Magazine/ explained 
that former Washington State Governor Booth Gardner, who is heading up a 
campaign to legalize assisted suicide in that state, envisions his 
campaign as part of a larger agenda. "Gardner's campaign is a 
compromise; he sees it as a first step. If he can sway Washington 
<http://www.internationaltaskforce.org/washington.htm> to embrace a 
restrictive law, then other states will follow. And gradually, he says, 
the nation's resistance will subside, the culture will shift and laws 
with more latitude will be passed...."

In the 2008 book, /Giving Death a Helping Hand,/ Margaret Battin (the 
author of the study described above) wrote that she doesn't believe 
assisted suicide should be "safe, legal and rare." Rather, she said it 
should be available, "as a preemptively prudent, significant, 
culminative experience." In the same book, Battin spoke approvingly of a 
situation in which two young men were planning a fishing trip several 
months in advance. One of the young men made certain that the trip would 
not conflict with his father's scheduled death.

Transforming assisted suicide from a crime into a medical treatment 
clearly is intended to lead to death on demand. Oregon's law should be 
recognized for what it is  a deadly Trojan Horse.

/Rita L. Marker <http://www.internationaltaskforce.org/biomarker.htm> is 
an attorney and executive director of the International Task Force on 
Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide. <http://www.internationaltaskforce.org/>/

Copyright ) International Task Force 2008

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