To the Editor:
This letter is in response to Doreen Adams’ letter urging support for physician-assisted suicide. I am writing in opposition to this proposal and why physician-assisted suicide should not be legalized. In 2012, voters rejected this proposal because it was and is a faulty law. It did not require a psychological test, and people with mental health issues could get a pass to kill themselves with doctor approval. Some of you may also remember the pharmaceutical ad where a pharmacist explained that people would have to swallow 50 pills in a very short time in order to die. If they didn’t, it would leave them permanently disabled. It would basically turn the person into a vegetable. Assisted suicide is anything but death with dignity. First of all, doctors are called to protect a patient’s life by any means and physician-assisted suicide exempts a doctor from doing that. In today’s technological world, we are making strides to better protect patient’s health. Hospice and palliative care in the U.S. is the best in the world, and we can make a person’s transition to death much smoother without killing them. Secondly, the right to life is the most basic human right that is protected by our Constitution and Declaration of Independence. If we take this right away, there is no limit as to what other rights that we enjoy as American citizens may be taken away. All human life is created with dignity by a God who loves us. All are called to unite their sufferings and pains with the sacrifice of Christ. He is the one who has planned our entire life and ultimately, it is He who decides the beginning and end of a person’s life. No one wants to see a loved one suffer, but is hastening their death really the answer? Last year, in an address to Catholic doctors, Pope Francis stated, “It is not lawful to take a human life to solve a problem,” and that physician-assisted suicide is the result of “a culture of waste.” We are called to help the sick and provide for them in their sufferings. May we all have a greater respect for human life from conception to natural death.
Tom Daener, Mattapoisett
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