Examination of Witnesses (Questions 420
- 422)
THURSDAY 21 OCTOBER 2004
DR TERESA
TATE, MR
DONAL GALLAGHER,
MS VICKY
ROBINSON, DR
ROBERT GEORGE
AND DR
DAVID JEFFREY
Q420 Chairman: Is that the paradigm
shift, that instead of death being seen simply as bad, it is seen
in some circumstances as a good?
Dr George: In terms of the minds of doctors
whom we tend to work with in diagnoses, treatment options and
all sorts of things like that, the point I am making is that bringing
death on, because of the situation in the law at the moment, as
you said is considered to be bad. If under some circumstances
assisted suicide or euthanasia is now considered to be an entitlement
of the patient—bringing it into statute makes it an entitlement—then
that becomes a therapeutic option and, therefore, it becomes a
potential duty for us to perform.
Q421 Chairman: That conclusion, in
a way, is just part of the logic; it is nothing to do with the
evidence of any jurisdiction?
Dr George: Not at all, it is a priori,
I would have said. In terms of saying; is this an explanation
for why non-voluntary euthanasia should take place; I do not think
they are increasing or reducing. If you look at the Dutch data,
it is fairly stable over the last five to 10 years. But, of course,
in Holland the decriminalisation of euthanasia sits quite a long
way back from that. If you look at the case law, then the case
law puts forward, for example in the Shabot case, a lady
with resistant depression following the suicide of her son who
made an application to the courts for euthanasia because life
was no longer worth living because of her resistant depression,
and that was granted. There are other examples of mentally incapacitated
patients, psychiatric patients and so on and so forth. If you
are saying that within society or within practice there is a treatment
that some people can have access to and others cannot, and it
is not based on the criterion of appropriateness, it is based
on the criterion of fairness or equality, then you are giving
people who are capable and able to ask for euthanasia a moral
status which is different from people who cannot, because our
duty is to act in best interests and if we see what we consider
to be suffering in an individual which we feel unable to address
and one therapeutic option is to end that life then surely under
best interests one of our duties is to end that life.
Q422 Chairman: Do I understand the
point you make is that, if it were appropriate it, should not
be restricted to those who are competent to ask for it but it
should be available to those for whom it is appropriate even if
they are not competent to ask for it?
Dr George: Exactly.
Chairman: I said an hour and a half and
I think we have had great help from you. We would like to thank
you very much indeed. The Committee has some deliberations to
do. We do thank you and are glad to have had your help. Thank
you.
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