Assisted Suicide bill to be debated in parliament

[Outrider]

This seems influenced by a proneness to the fallacy of modernity and change for the sake of it, with a hint of landing one one on the believers in the sanctity of life.

Something is new, therefore it's the fallacy of modernity... the idea that informed consent requires, you know, information, is not new.

It isn't the only post here which smacks of "Yes, it is a personal decision but then again, only if it has been run past a scientist."

And where is anyone suggesting that it be run past a scientist?

It is of course a decision to say goodbye to all that....expertise, debate, knowledge, treatment or whatever.

Expecting a medical professional to explain all the options to a patient is, to your eyes, saying goodby to expertise, debate and knowledge? Hmm....

O.

[ProfessorDavey]

This seems influenced by a proneness to the fallacy of modernity and change for the sake of it, ...

But it is actually you Vlad who is guilty of the opposite - effectively dismissing things simply because they, as you perceive them, modern.

I don't think the rest of us are guilty of your accusation, that somehow we perceive things that are more modern as inherently better. Nope each development, or lack of development, needs to be considered on its own merit - rather than (as we don't) falling into the fallacy of modernity or (as you do Vlad) falling into the fallacy of appeal to tradition.

And as Outrider points out, autonomy and the right of people to make their own choices is hardly a modern notion.

[jeremyp]

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/jan/21/assisted-dying-bill-amendment-anorexia-loophole

While anorexia nervosa, for example, does not itself meet the criteria for terminal illness … its effects (malnutrition) in severe cases could be deemed by some as a terminal physical illness, even though eating disorders are treatable conditions and recovery is possible even after decades of illness

That's some kind of high grade bullshit. No reasonable judge would rule malnutrition to be a terminal disease. This is just paranoia (which is also not terminal).

[ProfessorDavey]

That's some kind of high grade bullshit. No reasonable judge would rule malnutrition to be a terminal disease. This is just paranoia (which is also not terminal).

I agree - this seems to be scaremongering of the first degree.

Increasingly I feel those who are against are resorting to increasingly hysterical approaches and/or completely failing to address the actual issue, rather focussing solely on process. A good example being the Schroedingers approach to parliamentary time - at the same time criticising the assisted dying debate as taking up precious parliamentary time that could be better used for more important issues while also criticising the assisted dying debate for not being given sufficient parliamentary time for proper scrutiny.

Feels as if those on the opposing side realise that they have lost the argument on principle.

[Nearly Sane]

Can watch hearing here


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cy5k0qyled2t

[Spud]

For a doctor to assist a patient to die requires that he renounce his title of a doctor. Because as a doctor his job is to treat patients, where 'treat' is defined as "to use drugs, exercises, etc. to cure a person of a disease or heal an injury".

[Outrider]

For a doctor to assist a patient to die requires that he renounce his title of a doctor.

Nice of you to decide that for the entire profession - maybe, just maybe, we should leave it to them to decide if they want to adopt your definition, or if they're more interested in harm-reduction, or alleviating suffering, or any of a number of other ways of phrasing their motivation? Or, maybe, like much of the rest of existence, one definition does not fit all of the people involved - maybe it's for each Doctor to determine what their own motivation is, where their own ethical lines are.

Because as a doctor his job is to treat patients, where 'treat' is defined as "to use drugs, exercises, etc. to cure a person of a disease or heal an injury".

Is it? Can you show where that definition comes from? My own understanding - and this is my definition, you understand - is that they are there to help people. It's more open ended than yours, it encompasses yours, but it's not limited to yours. How does your standard help when the harm is continued life? Should the healthcare professionals just universally be required to wash their hands of it and let you suffer in silence when your disease is beyond their current available treatments?

You appear to be coming at this from a point of view of venerating life above all - please, correct me if I'm wrong in that - but for many of us life is a means to an end, not and end in itself, and if that life is no longer beneficial, no longer useful to us, no longer pleasant, no longer worth living for the person living it... how is stopping that suffering not treatment of what ails them?

O.

[Spud]

Is it? Can you show where that definition comes from?

The Cambridge dictionary.

Should the healthcare professionals just universally be required to wash their hands of it and let you suffer in silence when your disease is beyond their current available treatments?

I've observed the process of dying when working as a healthcare assistant. Far from washing their hands of a patient and letting them suffer, if a disease is beyond available treatment the job of a healthcare professional is to relieve pain and prevent discomfort.

harm-reduction, or alleviating suffering

You will never be able to research a patient's experience of suicide and find out if the harm they experienced at death was less than dying naturally.

[Steve H]

. I've observed the process of dying when working as a healthcare assistant. Far from washing their hands of a patient and letting them suffer, if a disease is beyond available treatment the job of a healthcare professional is to relieve pain and prevent discomfort.

That is not always possible. In the debate about the bill,, I've read of people constantly vomiting faeces and other horrors.

[Outrider]

The Cambridge dictionary.

Dictionaries don't define usage, they track usage, and I'd suggest that the point of this whole exercise is that, collectively, we're deciding to update that usage.

I've observed the process of dying when working as a healthcare assistant. Far from washing their hands of a patient and letting them suffer, if a disease is beyond available treatment the job of a healthcare professional is to relieve pain and prevent discomfort.

And now they'll have another tool in their arsenal - now patients won't always be trapped into that pained existence, and healthcare assistants won't always be limited to mitigating pain. In the future, if the disease is beyond available treatment, relieving pain and preventing discomfort will be one option on the table, it's not being taken away.

You will never be able to research a patient's experience of suicide and find out if the harm they experienced at death was less than dying naturally.

It will be for a significantly shorter duration, though. It will not be visible to their loved ones. It won't be something that circumstance makes them share with those around them. It won't be robbing them of their dignity and self-respect for days or weeks or months or years... It's almost like people in need will, finally, have a choice rather than being condemned by circumstance.

O.

[jeremyp]

You will never be able to research a patient's experience of suicide and find out if the harm they experienced at death was less than dying naturally.

It's exactly the same: they die.

It's not about the harm we experience  - everybody dies so we all end up with the same amount of harm. No, it's about alleviating the suffering on way to death.

Your position is essentially to stand by watching people being tortured on behalf of a faith they don't necessarily believe in. It's a pretty nasty attitude.

[ProfessorDavey]

Far from washing their hands of a patient and letting them suffer, if a disease is beyond available treatment the job of a healthcare professional is to relieve pain and prevent discomfort.

Of course that is the aim of palliative medicine - but it isn't always successful, even with the best palliative care currently available. And it isn't just pain and discomfort that are really important to people at the end of their lives but also dignity and autonomy. And often the very interventions that aim to relieve pain (typically very high doses of morphine) rob a person of dignity and autonomy. I've watched both my parents die and in both cases they had palliative care as good as anything available. In both cases the last few days were anything other than peaceful.

My experience of watching my father was of someone in terrible distress, but completely unable to be comforted as the morphine levels that were needed to deal with the pain had rendered him unable to interact, but clearly his largely unconscious state appeared wracked with what I can only describe a regular nightmares (I don't and cannot know what they were as he died shortly afterwards without regaining any meaningful consciousness). What was clear was that he was in a state of significant distress without anything family, or palliative care, could do to alleviate.

He had no choice other than to endure this awful state for several days before he died - what this bill is about is giving people like him a choice.

[Spud]

In both cases the last few days were anything other than peaceful.

I'm sorry to hear that. Do you know whether whatever it is that is given to patients to drink so that they die is pain-free? When our cat Spud was put to sleep the nurse came out crying. Afterwards I learned that the animal goes through acute distress when the lethal dose is given.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Ledbetter U turn on High Court Approval.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2egl17pvldo

[Nearly Sane]

Ledbetter U turn on High Court Approval.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2egl17pvldo

Not really a U turn but more what this stage of the Bill is for.

[Steve H]

Ledbetter U turn on High Court Approval.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2egl17pvldo

a rather tendentious way of putting it, since she probably only put that provision in in the first place to appease the opponents. The safeguards are unnecessarily restrictive at the moment, and should be reduced.

[Nearly Sane]

a rather tendentious way of putting it, since she probably only put that provision in in the first place to appease the opponents. The safeguards are unnecessarily restrictive at the moment, and should be reduced.

I think that that approach would tie in more with Vlad's comment. The change looks more to me about practicality and knowledge, and is part of what this stage should be looking at. The idea that the bill is framed solely to get through and to be changed later to be less restrictive is why in some cases the 'slippery slope' is not a fallacy.

[Steve H]

I think that that approach would tie in more with Vlad's comment. The change looks more to me about practicality and knowledge, and is part of what this stage should be looking at. The idea that the bill is framed solely to get through and to be changed later to be less restrictive is why in some cases the 'slippery slope' is not a fallacy.

There can't be a slippery slope before the bill has even become law! All bills get scrutinised and revised before becoming law. "Slippery slope" is just a meaningless parrot-cry of those who haven't got any real arguments.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

There can't be a slippery slope before the bill has even become law! All bills get scrutinised and revised before becoming law. "Slippery slope" is just a meaningless parrot-cry of those who haven't got any real arguments.

Getting a retired judge in cunjors up thoughts of films where they get befuddled, drunk and past it doctors to sign death certificates.

You don't trick people into thinking something one thing and then reverse it just to get it past them and to claim you are being being adult and honest.

[ProfessorDavey]

Not really a U turn but more what this stage of the Bill is for.

Exactly - the point of this stage in the process is for scrutiny and amendments. The suggestion seems sensible to me as it brings a greater range of expertise into the panel compared to a single judge.

And there was also concert that the judge stage may have resulted in unreasonable delays to decision-making which, as the person will only have months, or even weeks/days, to live would have created unnecessary distress and potential even rendered the choice of the individual irrelevant as they may have died before a decision was taken.

[ProfessorDavey]

Getting a retired judge in cunjors up thoughts of films where they get befuddled, drunk and past it doctors to sign death certificates.

You don't trick people into thinking something one thing and then reverse it just to get it past them and to claim you are being being adult and honest.

Of there we are - back to the Schrödinger opposition - on the one hand the scrutiny stage is too rushed and won't allow any changes - yet when changes are proposed the opposition pivots to claims of U-turns, effectively suggesting that there shouldn't be changes.

Say it after me Vlad - this stage of the Bill process is where the original wording is scrutinised and changes are debated and may be implemented.

[ProfessorDavey]

You don't trick people into thinking something one thing and then reverse it just to get it past them and to claim you are being being adult and honest.

But this will only become law if MPs vote in favour at the final vote - which will be on the basis of the amended Bill. If they aren't comfortable with the changes, presumably there will be sufficient MPs who change their vote from 'yes' to 'no' and the bill won't become law. That's how our parliamentary system works - just because the bill gained a majority at second reading allowing it to progress to the committee stage does not guarantee that the bill (whether or not amended) will pass at third reading and become law.

[ProfessorDavey]

The idea that the bill is framed solely to get through and to be changed later to be less restrictive is why in some cases the 'slippery slope' is not a fallacy.

But it would only be a 'slippery slope' if the current bill (assuming it becomes law) necessarily led to unintended consequences, different to those that the legislators intended. If the law was amended at some point in the future, then those changes would need to be formally approved by parliament and they would be intended and therefore not a 'slippery slope' at all.

Does the notion that gay people can now marry reflect a 'slippery slope' from the legalisation of gay sex in 1967 - I don't think so as the decision to allow gay marriage required new legislation and was an intended consequence of that legislation, not an unintended consequence of the 1967 legislation.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

But this will only become law if MPs vote in favour at the final vote - which will be on the basis of the amended Bill. If they aren't comfortable with the changes, presumably there will be sufficient MPs who change their vote from 'yes' to 'no' and the bill won't become law. That's how our parliamentary system works - just because the bill gained a majority at second reading allowing it to progress to the committee stage does not guarantee that the bill (whether or not amended) will pass at third reading and become law.

The Bill will pass or fail on the question of scrutiny.
There is of course the matter that those promoting it were sure that a high court judge provided that scrutiny.
With the suggestion of retired judges, not necessarily high court,
this seems to be Leadbeaters second final level of safeguarding which isn't the original solution "plus" as she suggests.

[Steve H]

Getting a retired judge in cunjors up thoughts of films where they get befuddled, drunk and past it doctors to sign death certificates.

You don't trick people into thinking something one thing and then reverse it just to get it past them and to claim you are being being adult and honest.

The legal profession needn't be involved at all. Two doctors should be enough.