Lee Pashkes on I 1000 at HA and Effin Unsound

Lee,

Can’t you do better than your comments over at Effin Unsound?

You give a (mostly) rational rebuttal of Attny Dorne’s position than somehow inveigle me? Sad.

If, as you claim, her brief in Montana is obsessed with concern that the act fosters a possible murder, I pretty much agree with you that she is pushing at the edges of rational concerns with I-1000. Reminds me of a recent post on someone sueing Jared Diamond for describing the savage practices of some cultures.

Are you pleased with how your legislation is being enacted here? It seems to me that having worked to get this in place, you would taske more interest in how it is implemented.

Many of my concerns remain. As I expected, very few WA physicians appear willing to use this option. Havinf a few pro-suicide docs doing this for patients they do not know well, is not very good.

While I think Dorne’s worries abiout murder are over the top, She is correct that the way the bill is worded, it would be nearly impossible to prove that some nasty person had misused the law to commit murder. There are also significant worries that the bill may prevent ME’s from accurately defining cause of death for public health and scientific purposes. There may also be issues I was unaware of because of the choice of drugs in the cocktail.

I-1000, unfortunately also did not set aside funds to cover regulatory and compliance costs. These may be quite high given the small number of expected users of the option.

My biggest concern is that the bill will be misused by healthcare providers anxious to save costs. As you must also know, there has been an episode of an insurance provider in Oregon raising the financial issue implicit on I-1000. Public outrage rightly scuttled that but the law remains with no prohibition of health care providers encouraging the suicide option as a way to save the costs of terminal care. Very similar issues of societal misuse may be arising , not yet in Oregon, but in England and Germany where therapeutic decisions are already subject to cost benefit analysis. One of the major issues that will face the healthcare reformers will be whether the US adopts similar laws.

Finally, the population with the greatest need for this choice, that is those undergoing extreme misery due to protracted non-lethal disease, remain unserved.

Oddly, I suspect you and I would be on the same side of that issue, people who face interminable suffering should be free to choose tom end their lives in a dignified manner.