Assisted suicide is the topic du jour in the British press. After I posted about Noel Martin’s story on Sunday, I learned about Dan James. James was a 23-year-old rugby player who became a quadriplegic after a training injury in 2007. Earlier this fall, he traveled to Switzerland with his parents for an assisted suicide.
In related news that was drowned out by the presidential election results, Washington state passed a ballot measure that legalizes physician-assisted suicide for terminally ill individuals. It becomes the second state after Oregon to have such a law on the books. The Swiss law is much more permissive; it does not require the involvement of a physician nor does it require that the person have a terminal illness. It’s difficult to conceive of any jurisdiction here in the U.S. enacting anything similar. I’ll be curious to see how other European countries–especially Britain–strengthen or weaken their own laws on assisted suicide in response.
a friend is writing her thesis as a policy analysis on whether laws like those in effect in washington/oregon would be feasible in minnesota or on a federal level. holler if you’d like a copy–it sounds like it should be v. interesting.
In Belgium there has been a great fuss this year about the asssited suicide of the famous author Hugo Claus, who sufferd from Alzheimer’s disease. In most newspaper articles his suicide was represented as if it was a brave, almost heroic act, but others (some philosophers and clergymen e.g.)said there’s nothing brave in ending your life.
It seems that my tiny country is fairly liberal, also in this respect.