John Kelly’s Testimony covers medical mistakes, class and race/ethnic divide and more by Diane Coleman, Not Dead Yet
by Diane Coleman
“Massachusetts Public Health Committee hearing on the state’s assisted suicide bill:
“Thank you. Everyone knows that doctors make mistakes, and studies show that 12 to 15 percent of people outlive the six-month hospice benefit for supposedly terminal people. But this year Oregon revealed that only 4 percent of its program participants have lived past six months. This suggests that a substantial number, up to one in 10!, ended their lives prematurely because they trusted their terminal diagnosis. For someone who barely escaped a terminal MISdiagnosis with their life, see the 2011 Boston Globe letter by Jeanette Hall. No one would tolerate any other elective, so-called “medical practice” this deadly.
The 2012 ballot question on assisted suicide shows a class and race/ethnic divide: wealthier towns in favor, more working-class towns, both white and of color, against. Brookline 67% in favor, heavily Latinx Lawrence 69% against. Black and Latinx people have long opposed assisted suicide by more than 2 to 1, and often have a well-earned mistrust of the medical system. These laws make dominant the outlook of a professional class obsessed with individual achievement, autonomy, and status – thus the constant use of the word “dignity,” over the worldview of a working-class that relies on a family support system, connection, and reverence for elders. By undermining the value placed on old, ill, and disabled people, these laws promote writing off people as having too low a quality-of-life.”
See more news: MedPage Today: Study Sheds Light on Physician-Assisted Suicide in Lung Cancer Patients
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