Oregon allows anyone from anywhere to obtain medically assisted death (with dignity) in the Beaver State, but it doesn’t always go as advertised, as in, ‘gee beave, I didn’t think it was gonna take that long to die.’
The new numbers come amid growing concerns that Oregon and other US states are liberalizing their assisted-suicide programs too quickly and following the example of Canada, where 13,241 people were euthanized in 2022.
What numbers? Oregan had a 21% increase in medically assisted suicides last year, with 367 known successes from the 560 people who were given drugs to kill themselves. My first question is, what happened to the death drugs given to the 193 people who didn’t kill themselves? The answer is that some of them may have killed themselves, and the state just doesn’t know.
And not everyone dies right away.
Ten people faced complications, such as vomiting up their drugs or getting a burning sensation in their throats. One patient took fully 137 hours — nearly six days — to die. OHA did not provide any more details about the slow death.
Vomiting and other complications are reportedly on the rise. A bad look for your death-with-dignity tagline. I can imagine someone saying, “I was expecting a peaceful departure surrounded by loved ones and a few of the state-employed “specialists” who convinced me this was the best way to go, but someone had to hold my hair while I puked in a trash can.”
I’m guessing they didn’t die unless it was out of embarrassment.
Oregon’s empathy has other features worth noting. While early adopters of Doctor-Assisted Suicide were on private health care, nearly eighty percent were on government health care.
“…health funding status changed from predominantly private (65%) to predominantly government support (79.5%), and there was an increase in patients feeling a burden and describing financial concerns as reasons for choosing an assisted death. There has been a reduction in the length of the physician–patient relationship from 18 weeks in 2010 to 5 weeks in 2022, and the proportion.”
A widening range of acceptable reasons to shuffle off the mortal coil is as common as the increased speed with which a “patient” may obtain approval for death drugs. States and nations that adopt it let mission-creep take control, and there’s never any turning or rolling back. Every new legislative session presents an opportunity to embrace more death.
Last year, Hawaii dropped the waiting period to 5 days. That’s barely time for a second date with Doctor Death. Not to be outdone, Colorado has legislation this year that reduces that waiting period to 48 hours. Ecuador’s highest court has effectively authorized Euthanasia without consent for those in a coma.
The Netherlands has justified the killing of chronically or terminally ill children without their knowledge or consent.
And then there’s Canada. It euthanized over 13,421 of its citizens in 2022, which is too low a number. It is looking for more reasons from mental health (including suicidal ideation), being a veteran, low income, drug abuse, long waiting periods for medical procedures or specific procedures themselves, or as a way to save the taxpayers a few bucks on government-run “care.”
On a brighter note, organ donations are up. And organ sounds a bit like Oregon.