When Euthanasia Crosses the Line into Murder*
By Joshua Krause
Wherever you stand on the issue of euthanasia, you would have to admit that consent must be given the highest order of importance during the process. After all, without consent you can’t rightly call it euthanasia anymore can you? At that point it’s just plain old murder, right? Don’t tell that to the doctors in Belgium though, where euthanasia has been legal since 2002. A few of them at least, seem to be more than willing to “jump the gun” on so many of their elderly patients.
A study published this month in the Journal of Medical Ethics examined the “deliberate” euthanasia of patients in Belgium without their explicit, voluntary consent as required by law.
The study’s author, Raphael Cohen-Almagor, a professor of philosophy and ethics at the United Kingdom’s Hull University, found that life-ending drugs were used “with the intention to shorten life and without explicit request” in 1.7 percent of all deaths in Belgium in 2013.
In 52.7 percent of these cases, the patients were 80 years of age or older. The decision to euthanize was not discussed with the patient in 77.9 percent of the cases because he/she was comatose, had dementia, or “because discussion would have been harmful to the patient’s best interest,” according to the study.
That last sentence is chilling isn’t it? Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time that Belgian medical staff have been outed for straight up murdering their patients. In 2010, the Daily Mail reported on the admission of 100 nurses, who claimed that they’d participated in the euthanization of patients (if you can call it that) without their consent.
More than 100 nurses admitted to researchers that they had taken part in ‘terminations without request or consent’.
Although euthanasia is legal in Belgium, it is governed by strict rules which state it should be carried out only by a doctor and with the patient’s permission.
The disturbing revelation – which shows that nurses regularly go well beyond their legal role – raises fears that were assisted suicides allowed in Britain, they could never be properly regulated.
However, Britain shouldn’t be so quick to judge their friends across the channel. Earlier this year, it was revealed that the National Health Service asked their doctors and nurses to start cold calling sick and elderly patients, to see if they’d like to establish a “do not resuscitate” order for future health emergencies.
Now that I think of it, perhaps euthanasia isn’t the problem here. Whether or not assisted suicide is ethical, I doubt the sky would fall down on a country that allowed it. No, the real problem here is when you allow any form of assisted death in a country that has forced socialized medicine on their citizens, which is exactly what Britain and Belgium have done.
Bureaucrats see the world through the lens of money, numbers, and paperwork, and they’re the last people who should be charged with the healthcare of millions of people. For them, saving money and increasing the efficiency of healthcare is just a simple matter of killing everyone who is expensive for the system. Allowing euthanasia in this kind of system makes it pretty easy for doctors to meet their quotas, if you know what I mean.
Enjoy your new socialized medical system America. You’re about to receive all the “healthcare” you’ll ever need.
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regardless of what you call it it is still murder. even if you consent it is still murder, if a person commits suicide it is murder. but in the end Jehovah is also a forgiving God understanding the causes of suicide and such. He can forgive when a person murders himself because he is so sick that there is no hope of improvment and is not in his right mind, and desires to end suffering. but this is a very gray area, he doesnt approve of help in suicide however. never should we impose a ‘duty’ on anyone else to help us die. that wouldmake them a party to the murder. euthanisa is nothing new, no doubt such a concept was common thorughout the ages. solomon wrote under inspiration, there is nothing new under the sun what has happened now has happened before, not exact quote but you get the point, I hope. I have had friends who have commited suicide and I have every reason based on my experience with worshipping Jehovah that he will forgive them, after all they served him joyfully for many years, in a moment of weakness and all they took their own life. sad really when your so sick or unhappy that you take your own life.