Page 2901 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 14 September 1994
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Under this Bill, before a person makes this decision they are required to be informed of alternative treatments; but that requirement is, I suggest, not going to be followed. The reason is that the requirement is being made of a doctor and a nurse. For a start, they may not know of various alternative treatments and they may have no interest whatsoever in various alternative treatments, many of which can handle pain exceedingly well. I know people that have gone to the dentist and had a great deal of work done on their teeth without any injections. It is not that they have not normally felt pain in their life, but they have used alternative methods of handling that pain. The point I make is that the information you get from some doctors and some nurses may not include alternative treatments that are available.
Secondly, they may not know the treatments. The patient may not know the treatments but, on finding out about such treatments, at a later time may decide that there are methods other than to remove treatment that is keeping them alive at the time. I think that the more realistic reason for someone to make a decision to end their life, to remove medical treatment, is a feeling of uselessness or that they have become a burden to their family or society. Why would someone make that decision? I suggest that it could be influenced by what their family and society feel - in some cases influenced greatly, in other cases perhaps not at all. I could see a situation where someone did not want to be a burden on their family. This viewpoint could be encouraged by the family not wanting the person to be a burden on them. Through various subtle or not so subtle methods, they could get across the point, "Gee, it really is difficult; but that is okay. We are happy to do this". It can be a subtle situation. It may be rare, but it is certainly possible.
Leaving these points aside, let us look at the situation of a particular person. This person was incontinent; this person had to be virtually spoon-fed for any sustenance. There is no doubt whatsoever that they were not capable of looking after themselves. Under those criteria many people would say, "It could well be a good idea to remove medical treatment". Actually, I was not talking about the end stages of someone's life; I was talking about the beginning stages of someone's life. The person was a baby. It brings up a relevant point, though it may sound unusual. The relevant point is: Are there responsibilities we have in life? We certainly acknowledge a responsibility to babies. Do we acknowledge the same responsibility to people when they are older? It is another interesting point.
I do not believe that you can keep anyone alive if they do not wish to remain alive. I have not heard this brought up in the debate on euthanasia anywhere. I believe that it is a compelling argument, and it comes back to: What is man? What are we? If you believe the "Man from Mud" theory that Wilhelm Wundt pushed just over 100 years ago, you may feel that it is a body and you can keep it alive because it has no volition in the matter; there is no say on behalf of the person. But I suggest that if you do a bit of study of psychology - and I do not mean what it is thought to become, the study of animal behaviourism; I mean the study of the psyche - the psyche of course is the immortal, rational spirit. That is the definition of man. It has been changed in a number of
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