Physician-assisted suicide movement advances

Physician-assisted suicide movement advances

WASHINGTON — Recent developments demonstrate the campaign to legalize physician-assisted suicide continues to make progress. The evidence includes:

– A Montana district judge ruled Dec. 5 residents of the state have the right to assisted suicide.

– A member of the Scottish Parliament said Dec. 9 she plans to introduce legislation next year that would not only legalize the practice in her country but could make it a right for children 12 and younger, The Scotsman reported.

– An assisted suicide — this one performed in Switzerland — was televised for the first time in Great Britain Dec. 10, according to The New York Times.

“Like the proverbial boiling frog, we are slowly feeling the temperature rise in the assisted-suicide movement, but too few people seem bothered by the heat,” said C. Ben Mitchell, a professor of bioethics and contemporary culture at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in suburban Chicago.

“The only way to turn back the tide is to show that there is a better way,” said Mitchell, a consultant on biomedical and life issues for the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. “Many Christian doctors, nurses and laypersons are modeling a compassionate countercultural alternative to assisted suicide by serving in palliative care and hospice.”