The Politics of Death: Committee Should Advance AB651

By None, San Francisco Chronicle, June 20, 2006

Editorial

TODAY, the state Senate Judiciary Committee will hear testimony for and against legalizing physician-assisted suicide in California. It is a topic that has evoked passionate debate, and became a political one when Terry Schiavo's heart-wrenching story was thrust into the national spotlight.

The hearing will not be easy for committee members. With issues as deeply personal and uncomfortable as terminal illness and death, the scrutiny and debate is understandable, and warranted.

Even in Oregon, the only state that has legalized physician-assisted suicide, the people's decision to pass the Death with Dignity Act faced several legal challenges until the U.S. Supreme Court recently upheld the ruling in January.

The thought of anyone, let alone a physician, helping another end their life seems both outrageous and unethical to many. That view is rooted in religious and professional beliefs that we respect.

But these opponents cannot, and should not, speak for individual patients who are facing impending death.

Assemblywoman Patty Berg, D-Eureka, and Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, D-Van Nuys, now hope to revive AB651, also called the California Compassionate Choices Act, first introduced in February 2005.

The bill involves a thoughtful process between patient and doctor, and includes the safeguards needed to ensure that the patient is well-informed and certain of their decision.

Modeled after Oregon's assisted-suicide law, the bill would allow Californians who have fewer than six months to live to request a lethal dose of medication. The doctor would be required to discuss the patient's condition, as well as alternatives, such as hospice care.

Patients who were experiencing depression or other psychological disorders, or were taking medications that would affect their judgment, would not be eligible. The patient would have to self-administer the lethal prescription, once ordered. An additional safeguard, which was not included in the original bill, requires all patients not in hospice care to have a psychological referral.

"From Oregon we've learned that even though only a tiny number of people end up hastening their deaths, thousands take comfort knowing the option is there for them," said Berg.

Today's hearing is an informational one before the committee votes on June 27. Committee members will no doubt hear valid arguments from both sides, with religion and politics at the center of the debate.

What committee members must remember when they vote, however, is that politics has no place at a patient's bedside during their final days.

"We live in a society where we are free to make so many choices about how we live," said Levine. "But at end of life, we don't have right to decide. It's about choice and respecting that choice."

The Senate Judiciary Committee should vote to advance AB651.

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