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In Belgium, a mentally ill 24 year old woman has been granted access to euthanasia.
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/healthy-24-year-old-granted-right-to-die-in-belgium/ar-AAckxLg?ocid=mailsignout
Doctors in Belgium are granting a healthy 24-year-old woman who is suffering from depression the right to die, as she qualifies for euthanasia, even though she does not have a terminal or life-threatening illness.
The 24-year-old female, known simply as Laura, has been given the go ahead by health professionals in Belgium to receive a lethal injection after spending both her childhood and adult life suffering from "suicidal thoughts," she told local Belgian media.
Laura has been a patient of a psychiatric institution since the age of 21 and says she has previously tried to kill herself on several occasions. She told journalists: "Death feels to me not as a choice. If I had a choice, I would choose a bearable life, but I have done everything and that was unsuccessful." The date of Laura's death is yet to be decided.
Two bioethicists recently published a compelling paper arguing that treatment resistant depression should be grounds for access to assisted dying.
http://jme.bmj.com/content/early/2015/05/02/medethics-2014-102458.full
Abstract Competent patients suffering from treatment-resistant depressive disorder should be treated no different in the context of assisted dying to other patients suffering from chronic conditions that render their lives permanently not worth living to them. Jurisdictions that are considering, or that have, decriminalised assisted dying are discriminating unfairly against patients suffering from treatment-resistant depression if they exclude such patients from the class of citizens entitled to receive assistance in dying.
What do you guys think about this issue?
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Someone sent me something similar recently http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/06/22/the-death-treatment
I can't personally understand it. In contexts outside of euthanasia/assisted suicide, we generally think of debilitating mental illness as making someone incompetent - like when it's used as a criminal defense. So I don't see that it makes sense that we would trust someone in that state to make this decision.
And mental illness is a really broad umbrella. For instance, I see key differences between euthanasia for people suffering from, say, Alzheimer's or MS or ALS, and euthanasia for people suffering from depression, of which suicide and suicidal tendencies are not only symptoms, but also side effects of treatments. Most of us are probably laymen when it comes to psychiatry/neuroscience but what I mean is I'm not sure these fields themselves have the exactness (yet) to suggest something like this.
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i could maybe agree with this is she'd be an organ donor, but barely.
why does she fails at suicide anyway?. + Show Spoiler +'cause she doesn't really want to die
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Oh, so she doesn't want to die, but is going to get a lethal injection, assisted that is. Maybe all her attempts were prevented by someone other than herself?
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On July 02 2015 11:15 Uldridge wrote: Oh, so she doesn't want to die, but is going to get a lethal injection, assisted that is. Maybe all her attempts were prevented by someone other than herself?
I'll believe it when she's dead. Till then this sounds like a masterful play for attention by everyone involved.
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I'm all for it. Not that I want people to die, I just can't stand the idea of governments telling people what they can and can't do. If she doesn't want to live then let her make her own choices and live and die by them.
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TLADT24917 Posts
While I'm pro-life and think that we should do everything in our powers to help these patients, I think what's most important is to understand things from the perspective of the patient before anything gets decided. They say that she has depression. Are we supposed to believe that she has tried every possible treatment available at this point? Overall though, this all feels like a slippery slope. People are free to die through doctor-assisted suicide if they want, but, lots of mental illness have medications that can help them deal with it and live as close to as normal life as possible especially something like depression which is quite common. I feel that we need more details which the article doesn't provide before we can come to a reasonable conclusion.
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On July 02 2015 12:10 BigFan wrote: While I'm pro-life and think that we should do everything in our powers to help these patients, I think what's most important is to understand things from the perspective of the patient before anything gets decided. They say that she has depression. Are we supposed to believe that she has tried every possible treatment available at this point? Overall though, this all feels like a slippery slope. People are free to die through doctor-assisted suicide if they want, but, lots of mental illness have medications that can help them deal with it and live as close to as normal life as possible especially something like depression which is quite common. I feel that we need more details which the article doesn't provide before we can come to a reasonable conclusion.
It's called treatment-resistant depressive disorder for a reason. It's not a slippery slope. It might be when it's just general depression, and the misleading OP title should be changed.
I assume doctors have done everything using the available knowledge in western medicine.
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In the absence of a religious based argument I cannot see any reason for a person of age and in a sane state of mind to be barred from choosing to end their life.
If life is bad enough that the neutral condition, death, is preferable to that person over living then they ought to be allowed to make that choice, and be helped to do so if needed. I would not have a problem with any person wishing to die being made to undergo a mental health test and perhaps a short counseling session to make sure they are truly able to make such a decision, have made the effort to try and live, and are committed to ending there existence.
On what logical grounds would one block a rational, mentally sound person from being allowed to end their own life?
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i dont think this "laura" exist, im sure her parents or relatives would reach out to journalists and so on but nothing showed up yet
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Well, I prefere this girl to die assisted by professionals where she won't suffer more than reason. And call me heartless but I very much prefere this scenario instead of someone jumping in front of a train, traumatizing the conductor, and delaying hundred of people. The only problem I see with this is that we are getting closer to officially killing people for "some diseases" that aren't easy to dignostic, and some paranoid people could have aftertought. But it's in Belgium and I don't think we even have spy agencies or weird gouvernment shenanigans.
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Marc Van Hoey that is probably pronounced different than I am imagining...
Well from someone who has had to deal with suicides, one upshot from assisted suicide vs 'the old fashioned way' is the friends/family/landlord doesn't get stuck cleaning up some bloody/stinky mess and dealing with the probable PTSD.
I have much less sympathy for successfully suicidal people than I should though.
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On July 02 2015 13:36 JieXian wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2015 12:10 BigFan wrote: While I'm pro-life and think that we should do everything in our powers to help these patients, I think what's most important is to understand things from the perspective of the patient before anything gets decided. They say that she has depression. Are we supposed to believe that she has tried every possible treatment available at this point? Overall though, this all feels like a slippery slope. People are free to die through doctor-assisted suicide if they want, but, lots of mental illness have medications that can help them deal with it and live as close to as normal life as possible especially something like depression which is quite common. I feel that we need more details which the article doesn't provide before we can come to a reasonable conclusion. It's called treatment-resistant depressive disorder for a reason. It's not a slippery slope. It might be when it's just general depression, and the misleading OP title should be changed. I assume doctors have done everything using the available knowledge in western medicine. Euthanasia in Belgium is only allowed if all other avenues have been explored and deemed futile by usually more than one doctor or specialist. It's not a decision that is taken lightly. Doctors can even refuse to do it if they don't feel comfortable about it, if I'm not mistaken.
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On July 02 2015 16:31 maartendq wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2015 13:36 JieXian wrote:On July 02 2015 12:10 BigFan wrote: While I'm pro-life and think that we should do everything in our powers to help these patients, I think what's most important is to understand things from the perspective of the patient before anything gets decided. They say that she has depression. Are we supposed to believe that she has tried every possible treatment available at this point? Overall though, this all feels like a slippery slope. People are free to die through doctor-assisted suicide if they want, but, lots of mental illness have medications that can help them deal with it and live as close to as normal life as possible especially something like depression which is quite common. I feel that we need more details which the article doesn't provide before we can come to a reasonable conclusion. It's called treatment-resistant depressive disorder for a reason. It's not a slippery slope. It might be when it's just general depression, and the misleading OP title should be changed. I assume doctors have done everything using the available knowledge in western medicine. Euthanasia in Belgium is only allowed if all other avenues have been explored and deemed futile by usually more than one doctor or specialist. It's not a decision that is taken lightly. Doctors can even refuse to do it if they don't feel comfortable about it, if I'm not mistaken.
Alright, good to know.
Mr BigFan here just has bad reading comprehension
They say that she has depression. Are we supposed to believe that she has tried every possible treatment available at this point?
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In this specific case, i don't see a problem. If a sane person of age wishes to die, i have no idea why they shouldn't be allowed to. Of course there need to be some protections in place to make sure that that is indeed the sincere wish of that person, as opposed to feeling pressured into it by the circumstances (For example not wanting to be a burden on their family). In this case, this does not seem to be a problem.
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I think some psychological conditions can be so severe that a person can have a genuine and reasoable deathwish, and euthanasia then seems like the humane option. Requests of this nature have already been granted dozens of times in the Netherlands, and rightly so.
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Netherlands4495 Posts
On July 02 2015 02:47 xM(Z wrote:i could maybe agree with this is she'd be an organ donor, but barely. why does she fails at suicide anyway?. + Show Spoiler +'cause she doesn't really want to die Not sure if troll or not. It makes sense to me that you're Romanian.
Two bioethicists recently published a compelling paper arguing that treatment resistant depression should be grounds for access to assisted dying.
I agree with this, but in Laura's case I think 3 years is a bit early to call it a treatment resistant depression.
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Interesting test case and it's a lot tougher if you think about it more than five seconds...and you believe Belgian doctors aren't idiots and already tried the broad solutions like antidepressant medication, exercise, music, etc.
I don't think they should euthanize her, personally, but I can see how it could be an option for someone who has no intention or ability to function in society but keeps bringing grief to herself and others with her repeated attempts at suicide. It might not just be humane for her but for her family and caretakers.
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On July 02 2015 18:07 coverpunch wrote: Interesting test case and it's a lot tougher if you think about it more than five seconds...and you believe Belgian doctors aren't idiots and already tried the broad solutions like antidepressant medication, exercise, music, etc.
I don't think they should euthanize her, personally, but I can see how it could be an option for someone who has no intention or ability to function in society but keeps bringing grief to herself and others with her repeated attempts at suicide. It might not just be humane for her but for her family and caretakers. Euthanasia is up to the patient. Doctors do not "euthanise" people, they merely execute the patient's (final) request after all other methods have been exhausted. Up until the last moment doctors will keep inquiring whether this really is what the patient wants.
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Why do people keep referring to her as a "sane person" who just happens to want to die? She's clearly severely mentally unbalanced. Would we give the same right to death to someone with dementia? Schizophrenia?
I'm not against euthanasia or even against it in this case but referring to this person as sane seems pretty crazy.
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