Psychiatrists have warned there may not be enough doctors in their profession to meet the needs of the assisted dying Bill.
Kim Leadbeater, the Labour MP behind the Bill, tabled a raft of last-minute amendments last week – scrapping the involvement of a High Court judge and handing the final decision to a three-member panel, comprising a social worker, a lawyer and a psychiatrist.
But two eminent professors of psychiatry have warned that staff shortages could make the inclusion of psychiatrists unworkable.
Sigh.
You’re not being asked to do anything. Well, other than just leave a pile of signed and otherwise blank permissions by hte door.
Indeed, what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.
“ He [the second doctor] was never interviewed, investigated or spoken to, and yet he’s pivotal,” said Ms Wesson.
“If he’d actually acted as a fail-safe, if he had had the knowledge [about our case] that he should have, and then national guidelines were followed, he would have said ‘this termination should not be offered’ and I’d still have my daughter.”
Mr Everson added: “The second signature, critically, is on there but he did not date it.“”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cpwxpzn4e9go
For a curious and even cynical man, with a deep distrust of government and the bureaucracy, you have one or two odd blind spots, Tim.
In this case it is trusting that the government and the bureaucrats haven’t built a nice wedge, the thin end of which you are presently regarding.
Erm, I think you’ve missed that I am even more cynical about this than you are.
I’d have more respect for the pro death crowd if they admitted what they really want, which is no safeguards at all. Maybe the grim reaper could front the next labour party political broadcast?
BTW does anybody remember when Trump went on about “death panels” and the left went mental?
I’m not sure I have, though I could be wrong. (It’s early where I am at the moment and I haven’t had my kafi.)
You appear (?) to think that the risk here is that of a cavalier approach which will lead to inappropriately prescribed end of life drugs being left willy nilly outside doors. I think this is merely the softening up process vis a vis our ancient objections to suicide, and that the risk is – some years down the road – doors being kicked down and orderlies rushing in to inject you. Or possibly eventually to shoot you.
I’ve been agin the very idea all along. First step on slippery slope etc.
In days of yore the elderly and infirm reached the end of their days at home. In developed nations, the soon to die are now moved into hospitals, hospices, and various kinds of nursing homes, so that the living are not burdened with the trauma of their deaths. When the elderly person’s health has deteriorated to circling the drain, inevitably the staff of those hospitals etc will expedite the process somewhat by withdrawing foods and liquids. This happens routinely a few hundred times a day and falls under the heading of harsh reality.
The Euthanasia Police, self-appointed please note, have reality issues and wish to prevent those who are dying of painful and unpleasant illness, from dying painlessly and mercifully. With great assiduity they dig out fringe cases which appear to show that the assisted death was murder, not euthanasia, although on close examination those cases do not rest on all four feet with the standard and the supposed connection turns out to be that in both instances medical personnel were involved, and the same form DD109 or something should have been signed in triplicate.
Haven’t you guys got some knitting or crocheting to keep you busy?
Oh yes, I know that – I just wondered which fork on the conspiracy theory mindset you were taking… mine or a more sensible one 🙂
I can’t speak for anyone else on here, but I don’t recall reading anyone opining that someone circling the drain should not be able to avail themselves of a painless and certain way out if such a thing exists.
My personal objection is that it’s the state doing the deciding that the drain circling has started. That same state that is utterly fucking incompetent at everything else/full to the brim of corrupt shysters (take your pick, probably mostly both), yet we should allow them to make that decision for us.
It doesn’t help that the bill as drafted is less assisted suicide, more state sanctioned murder. It is also strange to me that the cheerleader MPs for this bill seem to be the exact same crowd who would have a fit of the vapours if anyone suggested reintroducing capital punishment.
If we rebrand the death penalty as “assisted dying for criminals” then surely they’ll all support it?
Martin:
The term “death panels” I think predated Trump since it was IIRC from the Obamacare debate back in 2009.
The proper term, of course, is Harold Shipman Committees.
“With great assiduity they dig out fringe cases which appear to show that the assisted death was murder, not euthanasia”
Um, isn’t euthanasia actually murder in the UK? That is to say that while you are allowed to alleviate suffering that does not mean you are allowed to hasten death. So anyone actually killing people, even if they are likely to die soon anyway, is still committing murder. And still will be after this bill passes (if it does).
And I don’t think the Gosport Hospital Scandal was a ‘fringe case’.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3wp31358pqo
Over 400 deaths being investigated, 24 people identified as criminal suspects.
Suicidal thoughts? We can help! – the NHS
Just wait, there’ll be a linkup with organ transfer shortages and then it’s only one more step to compulsary donation in sentencing.
The idea that psychiatry is a reliable science is itself laughable.
It may be that one or two conditions are so easily recognised, and so reproducible in character, that they probably should be treated as an actual illness – e.g. schizophrenia. But by and large it’s been bogus from Freud onwards.
Dearieme – in my experience, psychiatrists are like 10 year old boys.
They both talk mad shit about Your Mum.
Thanks Ted. Must have been someone else. I thought it was later than that.
20 years from now when assisted death on the NHS is as routine as a handjob in massage parlour, we shall all be on our doorsteps, clapping and banging pans for Harold Shipman day – a true pioneer and saviour of our NHS
I’d have more respect for the pro death crowd if they admitted what they really want, which is no safeguards at all.
Yep. That’s exactly what I do want. I believe individuals should be free to make any decision they wish, providing it does not harm other people. End of.
As for coercion. We are coerced every day of our lives. People don’t seem to be able to resist coercing each other. Everybody thinks they know what’s better for us than we do.
My mother was coerced into a home. She hated it. Social workers saying she couldn’t look after herself. She was dead in six months. She’d have much rather died in her own home