The VE Bulletin Excerpts
'No price is too high to pay for
the privilege of owning yourself' Rudyard Kipling
Vol 18: No 2 July 2001
'Slow euthanasia' medical database
The recent death of Norma Hall revealed some of the limitations
of the current legal loophole that is exploited in the practice know as
'slow euthanasia'. In this process a terminally ill person may legally
refuse hydration, and a sympathetic doctor may elect to provide sedation
so that the dying person may remain asleep until they die. Is this assisting
a suicide or simply providing good palliation?
Clearly there are legal boundaries to be explored here.
In the case of Norma Hall's death it was considered a reasonable strategy
to find several doctors prepared to review the patient and countersign
the prescription for the sedative drugs. There will be other people wishing
to go down this route.
To facilitate these requests the Voluntary Euthanasia
Research Foundation (VERF) proposes that doctors who are sympathetic to
this issue indicate this to VERF, and ensure that they have current medical
registration. VERF would like to set up a database of doctors, sympathetic
to the practice of 'slow euthanasia', who would be prepared to be called
upon should the situation arise. Their willingness to travel and seek urgent
interim registration in other states would be of considerable assistance.
VERF would be prepared to pay the medical registration fees for those doctors
who have let their medical registration lapse. For further information
: contact VERF PO Box 37781, Winnellie NT 0821. Tel: 0500 83 1929, Fax
08 8339 7563
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