If a person wishes to take their life, I do not think that they should involve others.

Undoubtedly many will remember the case when Nitesche assisted in a suicide (euthanasia) The woman had had stomach cancer and due to the pain she was suffering, believed it had returned.

The oncologist (mentioned above) told me that a postmortem revealed this woman hadn't had a recurrence of cancer, but was experiencing pain from lesions. These could easily have been removed with very minor surgery.

Incidentally, the oncologist I mentioned is an atheist so has no religious trumpet to blow.

*If a person wishes to take their life, I do not think that they should involve others.*

Well yes, it should be the choice of the patient and nobody else.That is exactly how the laws in say Switzerland are framed. But most of these patients are bedridden. Some cannot move a muscle, as say the case of Mr Rossiter in Perth, there was a courtcase about it.

Mr Rossiter was given one choice, choose to die by starvation. The option of sipping a drink containing say Nembutal, would have been the kind option. It would have been his considered choice alone, after months of reflextion. We denied him that choice, due to our legal system. So it needs changing.

There are indeed too plenty of cancer patients who come to the point where they simply have had enough of the whole circus of hospitals, near death chemotherapy and all the rest. They want the option of deciding that they have had enough. Never forget, that for the medical industry including doctors, medicine is still a business.

Yabby,

I understand that a person who has legal Guardianship of someone can decide for them - if they are not able to do so for themselves, either from infirmity, dementia, or illness - for treatment to cease, and palliative care commence.

Yabby,

"There are indeed too plenty of cancer patients who come to the point where they simply have had enough of the whole circus of hospitals, near death chemotherapy and all the rest."

Yes. They can request the treatment cease and they go onto palliative care providing a comfortable death.

*Yes. They can request the treatment cease and they go onto palliative care providing a comfortable death.*

Err Daniele, if one day you intend to spend your time waiting for death, and its not always as comfortable as you seem to imagine, well good luck to you. If that is your perspective well great, but others have quite a different perspective as to what the journey of life and death are all about. What we did to Mr Rossiter was basically torture, IMHO. He was in palliative care, staring at the ceiling, waiting for death. An active mind, trapped in a basically dead body. Years and years of exactly that, were his only option. Hardly a life worth living, unless you have some massive fear of death.