A bill legalizing physician-assisted death for terminally ill patients in Colorado is being drafted and would probably be introduced later this year.
Roland Halpern, the regional director of Compassion and Choices in Denver, said surveys show that 90 percent of people ages 65 and older want to die at home but only 24 percent have been able to achieve it, and 55 percent of them will succumb to a terminal illness.
Halpern said even in Oregon only about 60 percent to 65 percent of patients who get the prescription to end their lives use it, but they want to have that option.
I believe that a step towards having this law approved in Colorado is to better educate the public. Most people may not know that there are very specific requirements when a patient wants to participate in physician assisted suicide not just anyone can participate. A good beginning would be to reach out to those people who have had family in hospice care. These people have been through an experience where a love one is suffering and they just want to have the suffering put to an end. Hospice care in ways can be similar to assisted suicide. The whole point of both is to ease or put an end to those who are suffering with terminal illness. The patient is given round the clock care and provided with as much as possible. They are also pumped full of morphine which in a way makes them unresponsive to those around them. Of course another problem that comes into play is religion. People with some religious beliefs aren’t always big supporters of assisted suicide because to them it is morally wrong, just like everything else in this world there are going to be people who agree and those who disagree.
The facts of assisted-suicide need to be carefully analyzed when it comes to deciding whether or not assisted-suicide is morally acceptable in the state you live in. 10% of nurses who have euthanized an individual have reported involuntary euthanasia on terminally ill patients. That number is likely higher considering most do not report criminal acts. Assisted-suicide has been considered an alternative to palliative care, which keeps an individual alive that is not able to support themselves. Palliative care is an expensive burden on families of terminally ill patients and has proven to not be the most efficient way of dealing with terminally ill individuals. Assisted-suicide is an issue that needs to analyzed by looking through facts and not by personal opinion.