California Assembly approves legislation promoting euthanasia of terminally ill patients
Christian Examiner staff report
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — An end-of-life bill that would require doctors
to tell their terminal patients about options to hasten their deaths, including
starving themselves, passed the Assembly May 28 and will be heard on the Senate
floor.
According to an analysis by Concerned Women for America,
the bill undercuts established medical advances to ease dying for terminal
patients and, in some cases, would allow end-of-life medical care to be passed
on to less qualified health-care providers such as nurse practitioners and
physician assistants.
“While careful pain management and palliative care
at the end of a truly terminal illness are extremely important and support must
be given to dying patients and their families, this bill, as
written, is a step down a very slippery slope toward the assisted suicide bill
we fought in last year’s session,” the CWA analysis reads.
Opponents of the bill say that it paves the way for a shift in pallative
care that goes beyond pain relief to unconscious dehydration and starvation
through the use of strong sedatives.
Further, they argue that the
one-year-left-to-live diagnosis is arbitrary and often wrong, and
requiring doctors to offer end-of-life options hits patients when they are most
vulnerable. Some medical experts also believe that forcing doctors to
even discuss those issues constitutes endorsement of the practices.
Finally, opponents are concerned those without health
insurance and who are poor, might feel pressured into end-of-life decisions
because of burdensome financial legacies for their families.
But
Patty Berg, a Santa Rosa Democrat, who sponsored the bill with Lloyd Levine,
D-Van Nuys, said the legislation is merely promoting “honest talk” about medical
options. Berg, who was unsuccessful in three previous attempts to legislate
physician-assisted suicide, decided this year to try a different approach.
Her latest bill is supported by Compassion and Choices, a
pro-euthanasia group that was formerly called the Hemlock Society.
“Unlike my previous end-of-life bill, which was rejected and which I no
longer am pursuing, my new bill doesn’t give anyone any new options,” Berg wrote
in a May 15 opinion piece for Capitol Weekly. Everything that is illegal now—and
that most notably includes physician-aided dying—would remain illegal. AB 2747
changes none of that. Instead, it provides a precious commodity— information.
“Most people in the Capitol understand the difference. Some, however,
are still fighting last year’s battle and are trying to convince the gullible
that my new bill is a Trojan horse, designed somehow to legalize aid-in-dying.
That is simply not the case.”
But Marilyn Golden, a policy analyst at
the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund, disagrees and in a May 22
rebuttal in Capitol Weekly.
“The real ‘honest talk’ about AB 2747 is
that it has very little to do with improving care,” Golden wrote. “For this
bill, the devil is really in the details. Close inspection reveals it to be a
vehicle for Compassion and Choices’ long-term agenda: facilitating assisted
suicide. Let’s not forget that this is the organization formerly
known as the Hemlock Society and one of the primary sponsors of this
legislation. The bill includes many elements that would significantly
undermine end-of-life care in service of this goal.”
The Assembly vote
was 42-34. The bill will now be heard in the Senate Judiciary committee.For more
information on AB 2747, the end-of-life bill visit these links:
• Assembly bill text and history
• Concerned Women for America
• California ProLife Council
• Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund
Click
here to see- How
the Calif. assembly members voted on the end-of-life bill
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