Euthanasia activists keep trying to stretch the envelope. In New South Wales, Australia, a bill has been introduced that would not only permit active euthanasia but would be allow a very broad array of ill and disabled patients to be killed upon request. From, The Rights of the Terminally Ill Bill 2013 (PDF):

In this Act: assist or assistance, in relation to the death or proposed death of a patient, includes: (a) the prescribing and preparation of a substance for the patient, and the giving of a substance to the patient, for self-administration, and (b) the administration of a substance to the patient, if the patient is physically incapable of self-administering the substance.

That includes active and direct killing by doctors, baby!

There are also no time limits for a “terminal illness,” even if a treatment might be available to cure or extend life, but the patient doesn’t want it:

Terminal illness, in relation to a patient, means an illness which in reasonable medical judgment will, in the normal course, result in the death of the patient . . .

A primary medical practitioner may assist a patient to end the patient’s life only if all of the following conditions are met: . . . (iii) in reasonable medical judgment, there is no medical measure acceptable to the patient that can reasonably be undertaken in the hope of effecting a cure . . .

Someone with diabetes could qualify under that loose definition, even if currently sustained with insulin, if daily injections were “no longer acceptable to the patient.” Ditto, other conditions like HIV infection if asymptomatic and the patient doesn’t want to take the drugs to stave off AIDS. Any of us could name a whole host of illnesses and disabilities that could be considered “terminal” under these very loose criteria.

There’s more of the usual stuff, but I am so sick of the spiking fever of death obsession that I am not up to discussing it any more right now. If this keeps up, medical schools will have to hire veterinarians to teach future doctors how to put people down.

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Wesley J. Smith, J.D., Special Consultant to the CBC
Wesley J. Smith, J.D., Special Consultant to the CBC