Euthanasia bill undermines my protection

Bills increase choice and rights: MP (Letters, April 17)

After significant reflection concerning MP Steven Fletcher’s response to my letter about his euthanasia bills, I find it interesting that he stated my concerns about his motives are ridiculous. When I was younger, I had several very painful surgeries. If someone had asked me, while I was in severe pain, if I wanted to die, I would have said yes. When I am at a low point in my life, I do not want someone questioning me about whether I should live. Fletcher’s euthanasia bills undermine protections in law for me. Fletcher states that his bills will “empower competent adults to make decisions for themselves based on their own values and ethics.” His bills actually empower physicians and the state to kill people by euthanasia. People with disabilities, people with Alzheimer’s/dementia, people with cognitive disabilities, are all put at risk by Fletcher’s bills. Fletcher speaks about choice, but these people are dependent on others to make decision for them. In Belgium, a recent study found that people with Alzheimer’s/dementia or in a coma were often being killed without request, and yet the Belgium law has the same supposed safeguards as Fletcher’s bills. In Switzerland, the assisted-death groups have established themselves in nursing homes. Once assisted death becomes a legal option, it also becomes an everpresent suggestion. Legalizing euthanasia does not create greater rights for people with disabilities and the frail elderly but rather it will often lead to the death of vulnerable people.

STEVEN PASSMORE, HAMILTON