We know when we are in the vicinity of rational reduction when we read phrases like: " If life is a fatal sexually transmitted condition, " If this is the starting point it is no wonder that we can speak so freely about giving a little push over the edge.

<It is the health care workers who see death and suffering – and it should be more of the
<community as a whole.

To a large degree in our society, death and dying that once happened in the home, has been put into hospitals.

The contributing factors tend to be, society expectations, the medical profession, the legal profession.

Had the palliative care in my home until death of my aged demented cancer-ridden mother-in-law a few years back.

Can't say it's got much to recommend it.

The world is well overpopulated as it is. Why are we so afraid to discuss the option of suicide? Why is our departure controlled by politicians?

I argue there is far too much government interference in our lives. At least get out of our way when we've had enough!

Mikester, there is no correlation between global population and suicide. The people we are discussing are hardly going to rise from their deathbeds and procreate. Your comment is callous and misguided.

My mother-in-law was assisted in her last days by a very good man, a surgeon with a conscience. He arranged for pain management, a private room and permission for immediate family to share her passing, which we did. He also offered private advice which resulted in our declining the offer of transfer to a hospice, for the simple reason that we would not have been permitted to be at her bedside.

This surgeon may well have acted to hasten my beloved mother-in-law's passing through generous administration of morphine: we will never know for sure.

What we do know for sure is that she was treated very well, with dignity and compassion and that to the limit of her consciousness, she knew that she was surrounded by her children.

We cherish those last few days as much as we do any from the decades when she was fully competent.

My thanks for a compelling argument for rational discussion of death. It is a discussion we must have.

Great argument for a wholesale change over to a long overdue, and vastly less costly preventative care model.
So called population pressures are only ever able to be contained and even reversed by education, but particularly girls, who (as the other half of the human race or community) have as many rights as those reserved just for blokes, in some parts of the world; usually the most over populated parts of the world/human community!
People already have an unimpeded right to extinguish their own lives and by multiple means!
And therefore this conversation about euthanasia, is a distraction or seeks to compel others, dedicated to saving life, to assist!
Already we have ample evidence, where this seems to have been fanatically abused; with a perfectly healthy Gold Coast granny assisted to die, and another similar case, where an able bodied WA man, still in the prime of life, helped with professional medical advice, to self terminate, as a cure for depression.
And that's only those (tip of the iceberg) appearing in the daily headlines!
Better we should work on curing depression, (missing brain chemistry) than assist the premature termination of a still useful life!
The proposed goal of the article?
I also watched a demented parent go slowly downhill.
Fortunately, one of us was strong enough to ensure he was hospitalized into an aged care institution, and watched as a very angry vegetable, went to a very contented one.
[Family in home care, in these cases, the worst possible choice; given the inevitable emotional involvement!]
Baby talk, some hands on human affection and medication.
He died peacefully in his sleep at his natural end!
What is wrong with people, who invariably see a problem with that?
Lack of normal human empathy perhaps?
Rhrosty.

The author is correct in saying that many doctors do already practice a form of euthanasia, usually with palliative patients.

However, I would suggest that asking some doctors to do this when a patient is not in the last stages of a palliative illness is another thing altogether.

If a doctor, the patient and their relatives know that a particular palliative illness will eventually be very hard to manage the symptoms effectively with all the modern resources we have, then they may well choose to have euthanasia earlier on in the illness.

If we had legalized voluntary euthanasia, will most doctors be willing and able to walk in, have a chat with their patient, then pull out the lethal injection and give it calmly?
Some will, but many won't.

It is certainly easier to give the final injection to someone who is unconscious, or in uncontrolled pain or discomfort near the end of their life, than to someone who is terminally ill, but not suffering as such, yet.

I hope voluntary euthanasia does become legal, but it will need to be heavily regulated, and the number of doctors willing to offer the service may well be limited...

Rhosty and Suseonline, have you actually considered what Peter Baume is talking about? You have made ill-considered remarks ignoring the fact that he refers to the Northern Territory Rights of the Terminally Ill Act, voted in by their Legislative Assembly but overriden by the Federal Government, care of Kevin Andrews. That legislation only permitted assisted death under very stringent conditions: e.g., an adult person had to be incurably terminally ill (certified by 2 specialists) who had to be lucid, and aware of the circumstances, not suffering from depression (again with specialist certification) but finding other suffering unbearable. They had to have made the request for assistance to die more than once over a period of time. Anything less than this would be unlawful. Many jurisdictions are satisfied that allowing for physician-assisted suicide does not result in all sorts of murderous acts. So glib talk citing cases that don’t follow such conditions, or of people who did not suffer unbearably, or doctors having a ‘chat’ and then pulling out a needle, are irrelevant and potentially harmful.
Your unthinking and insensitive attitude trivialises a very serious and all too common set of circumstances, and condemns many people, (and not 'just' the elderly - many young people are terminally ill), to unbearable and heartless suffering at the end of their lives.