Assisted Suicide
Scots assisted suicide bill would endanger dementia sufferers
A leading expert has warned that Liam McArthur's Assisted Suicide Bill would endanger patients living with dementia.
Writing in the Scotsman, Professor June Andrews OBE said that dementia meets the definition in the Bill of an 'advanced and progressive disease' that is expected to cause 'premature death'.
Under the McArthur Bill, doctors would be legally empowered to offer certain patients the option of being given lethal drugs so they can kill themselves.
Professor Andrews said it would be 'impossible to uphold' any safeguards for dementia patients because the law could be expanded on discrimination grounds.
She said:
The dangers are clear when you consider the practical and ethical problems of applying a law that permits you to end someone’s life, especially if the people involved have dementia, or are afraid of the condition. I’d issue a challenge to MSPs: what makes you think that you can draft something for Scotland that will avoid the ethical disasters that have unfolded in countries that have already got this?
A recent survey suggested Brits are very cautious about the legalisation of assisted suicide. More than four in ten who support assisted suicide had serious doubts about its safety.
In total, the poll by Whitestone Insight of 2,001 British adults and commissioned by think tank Living and Dying Well, found 43 per cent of those in favour of law change admitted there are complicating factors to make it a practical and safe option.
The House of Lords is expected the debate Lord Falconer's Assisted Suicide Bill in the coming months.
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