It’s time to stop letting proponents of Act 39 promote the false narrative that this law is about personal choice. It’s a prescription for abuse and we need to face that we are putting vulnerable Vermonters at risk by allowing it.
This Op-Ed by Disability Rights Activist Stephen Mendelsohn, published in the Connecticut Mirror, articulates it well:
“So when proponents claim that there have been no abuses in Oregon, let us remember Thomas Middleton. Let us remember Barbara Wagner and Randy Stroup, denied chemotherapy by Oregon Medicaid, which offered to pay instead for their assisted suicides.
Let us remember Kate Cheney, age 85 and with dementia. Although a psychiatrist concluded that she had dementia and was being pressured by her daughter, she died after taking the suicide prescription. Let us remember Michael Freeland, with a history of depression and suicide attempts, who was prescribed lethal drugs. Let us remember Patrick Matheny, Cynthia Barrett, David Prueitt, and Wendy Melcher. These are just the cases we know about; what about those that have gone unreported?”
Read the entire piece here: http://ctmirror.org/2015/03/06/op-ed-assisted-suicide-would-be-fraught-with-problems-and-abuses/