Bill to Legalize Assisted Suicide in Alaska Scheduled for Public Comment
A bill to legalize doctor-prescribed suicide in Alaska has been scheduled for public testimony, via teleconference, on Thursday, April 9 at 3 p.m. House Bill 99, sponsored by Anchorage Democrats Rep. Harriet Drummond, Rep. Andy Josephson and Rep. Max Gruenberg, would permit doctors to prescribe lethal drugs to patients for the purpose of suicide.
Opponents of the practice believe that patients – including those with terminal illness – need proper care, not destruction.
Anchorage Archbishop Roger Schwietz, who leads 30,000 Catholics across Southcentral Alaska, strongly opposes the bill, saying it is not about granting people a so-called “right to die,” but pushing “doctors to prescribe lethal drugs to kill people.”
“In a state with a suicide rate twice the national average, we are now proposing that it should be legal in some instances,” Archbishop Schwietz told the Catholic Anchor. “What kind of message does this send to our youth? In their young minds, they look at life without the practical experience that comes from age. They may view their situation as equally depressing or as terminal as someone with an illness. They see no way out. ‘If it’s okay for those who have no hope of regaining their health to kill themselves, why can’t I?’”
The proposed Alaska bill is part of a national drive by an outside group called Compassion & Choices, formerly the Hemlock Society. To date, doctor-prescribed suicide is legal in Oregon, Washington, Vermont and Montana.
In a press release on her HB 99, Drummond lauded the Oregon law in particular, which has resulted in over 300 deaths since 1998.
Access Alaska, a disability advocacy group in Anchorage, posted a strongly worded rebuttal to doctor-prescribed suicide shortly after Drummond introduced HB 99.
“What looks to some like a choice to die begins to look more like a duty to die to many disability activists,” Access Alaska posted to its Facebook page. “If the values of liberty dictate that society legalizes assisted suicide, then legalize it for everyone who asks for it, not just the devalued old, ill and disabled. Otherwise, what looks like freedom is really only discrimination.”
The post was a quotation from Diane Coleman, president and CEO of Not Dead Yet¸ a national disability rights group that opposes doctor-prescribed suicide. (See “Bill to Legalize Assisted Suicide in Alaska Scheduled for Public Comment”, originally posted HERE)
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