Assisted Dying: Pros and Cons

In a viable human, pain serves a very useful purpose. It encourages the individual to avoid or move away from potentially damaging situations. It also makes them more amenable to receiving care and comfort from others. Folk, lacking a functional pain mechanism, have very difficult lives. Intractable pain can't be negated by medications. It seems obvious that intractable pain, in the case of a dying individual, only serves to make the situation more awful, for him/her and their loved ones. UK MPs have just voted in favour of potentially giving some terminally ill folk the right, in England and Wales, to get medical assistance end their lives. Intractable pain will generally (but not always?) be the trigger for a persons taking such a decision. That 'right' has not yet been conferred. The private member's bill, in question, will simply go to the next stage of being debated, examined and (possibly/probably) amended. The current bill is very tightly worded. It only applies to folk with less than 6 months to live, who have the capacity to make an informed decision. Two doctors and a judge also have to be convinced of the decision's legality and appropriateness. For decades circa 75% of the UK's general public have been in favour of assisted dying. The vote in parliament was, however, much closer. Folk in favour of the measure generally think a) exposing other humans to prolonged pain is wrong (most wouldn't let an animal suffer in this way) and b) people should have a 'right' to decide when to die (along with other 'rights'). A wider variety of reasons (not all employed by the same individuals) have been advanced by opponents of the bill. They include a) the sanctity of life argument, often with religious overtones; b) opposition to any state-regulated 'suicide service'; c) the 'slippery slope' concept, where greater numbers of people end up being included in the service than were envisioned by the act; d) candidates for euthanasia, being pressured/feeling pressured to 'end things' by sometimes rapacious relatives and e) costs for the health and legal services (https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/nov/29/mps-vote-for-assisted-dying-in-england-and-wales). I don't normally baldly state my own opinion. In this case, I will make an exception. I am in favour of much improved 'end of life' care provision, as well as wider access to hospices. These are in the UK, however, currently very much subject to a 'post-code lottery' (their availabilties and qualities are highly geographically variable). This isn't likely to change, any time soon. I do think that folk, with proper safeguards, should have a choice of asking for assisted dying. I believe, however, that the current bill is too 'tight' (probably to 'get it through' parliament?). Six months is a very short period. Why should some folk potentially be subject to years of intractable pain, simply because they may live longer? Isn't longer worse in this case? People with religious objections to assisted dying, are certainly entitled to those views. They, and others objecting to the idea, presumably won't be using the service? Their objections should not, however, be foisted on what's now a largely secular population. Costs to services also shouldn't be a real consideration. Richer folk in the UK, already have the potential option of travelling to other countries for assisted dying. Should poorer folk simply have to suffer? The UK's National Health Service was designed to operate 'from the cradle to the grave'. A good assisted dying bill, needs to be part of that. The UK is actually coming rather late 'to the party'. Assisted dying has been available in a number of countries for at least a decade. We should be taking best practise from them.