[ Rules / FAQ ] [ meta / b / media / img / feels / hb / x ]

/b/ - Random

Name
Email
Message

*Text* => Text

**Text** => Text

***Text*** => Text

[spoiler]Text[/spoiler] => Text

Image
Direct Link
Options NSFW image
Sage (thread won't be bumped)
Check the Catalog before making a new thread.
Do not respond to maleposters. See Rule 7.
Please read the rules! Last update: 04/27/2021

IMG_7224.JPG

Anonymous 23559

Suppose for the sake of argument that prodromal Alzheimer's could be detected with reasonably high specificity. Should individuals who had received such a diagnosis be allowed recourse to physician assisted suicide if they choose?

What about those whose mentation is already ravaged by the disease? If they had stipulated earlier, while of sound mind, in a notarized document that, should they become demented, they would wish to be euthanized, is it proper to fulfill this request?

From my perspective the real danger of such policies is that it may result in situations where elders feel compelled by their families to plan for or choose euthanasia. However I also feel that, if I were diagnosed with prodromal Alzheimer's, I would want to have the option of being killed by a medical professional in order to avoid a fate I consider worse than death.

What do you think? Are the potential moral harms too great? Do you have religious objections? Do we have any duty to help those who wish to preempt the disintegration of their minds with voluntary death?

Anonymous 23561

The morality I subscribe to doesn't require people to use "extraordinary" measures to keep people alive.

Actively killing them is a no-go for reasons you mentioned (and generally).

However, providing food and drink to someone who isn't able to get them anymore is not "extraordinary".

I personally think we should let people die more commonly. But I don't exactly know what happens with Alzheimer.

Anonymous 23563

The choice should be there, but it shouldn't be forced or anything. Maybe it would put pressure on some people to sign their lives away, but if they actually want to deteriorate there should be more options for that if heir family doesn't want to care for them. Care homes are in a pretty bad state right now but that's another issue.

I think most non-religious families and individuals seem to agree that Alzheimer's is like basically losing someone/dying anyway.

The only other danger I can identify is if they are approached while their mind is already partially harmed by the disease. We'd have to make policies for that.

Anonymous 23564

>>23561
>But I don't exactly know what happens with Alzheimer.

In the later stages the physiologic processes which regulate things like water homeostasis and swallowing are so disordered that death often occurs due to pneumonia or dehydration.

Anonymous 23575

Absolutely not, there has already been a highly publicized case where a women with Alzheimer's who had previously assented to being euthanized had a moment of lucidity and tried to resist assisted suicide but was still forced to die. The doctor was cleared of all wrongdoing.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/doctor-netherlands-lethal-injection-dementia-euthanasia-a7564061.html

This is murder.

Anonymous 23584

>>23575
Nah I'd want them to kill me anyway despite what my blabbering demented husk has to say about it. Ideally one would be euthanized before faculties deteriorate to such an extent however.

>this is murder

Catholicism: not even once

Anonymous 23587

>>23584
>Catholicism: not even once
That's kind of random, you don't have to be Catholic to think someone getting pinned downed while trying to resist getting killed is murder.

Anonymous 23589

>>23584
Also I want to add I used to be a caregiver in a home for people with dementia and I have seen a lot of people die from this disease. Someone that says they want to die one day could be perfectly happy the next day laughing and smiling and enjoying what's left of their life the next day. The disease takes everyone differently, some people decline rapidly and can be dead in a week when they were walking and able to feed themselves, for some people it's a slow burn where they become bedbound for months. But even the people I worked with who could no longer talk, drink water, or even open their eyes at the end of their lives and who declined very slowly would still smile when someone touched their hand and spoke to them kindly. When someone is sad and scared because they are sick with a horrible disease you don't just kill them, you comfort them. People will be exploited and killed if assisted suicide is legal, it's already happening.

Anonymous 23590

>>23587

Fuck you and your self-righteous sadism that smacks of romish popery. I want doctors to murder me if the alternative is to go on living with the material substrate of my being and mentation hollowed out like a dead tree. Thankfully this is the direction all developed nations are going in anyway, Bronze Age ethics be damned.

Anonymous 23593

>>23590
Just take your life in your own hands if you feel that strongly about it. When it's legalized everywhere even more innocent people will be hurt.

Anonymous 23596

>>23593
the whole point of the above link was that the person in question was not capable of taking their own life, they're not even mentally competent enough to be legally responsible for it. it's like saying 'if you ever find yourself in a coma you should kys'
okay, jan.

Anonymous 23599

>>23596
End-stage Alzheimers isn't just something that suddenly happens to you. You can kill yourself long before you get to that point. Why do you need the state to validate your choice if you are determined to kill yourself?

Anonymous 23603

>>23596
Also kind of weird that you're calling me a sadist Catholic for saying killing someone who is trying to resist it is murder but then in your response you literally said "I want doctors to murder me." Even though you want it legalized even you are agreeing that it's murder.

Anonymous 23614

>>23599
If you have Alzheimers, you don't know that you have it. It's called anosognosia.
>>23603
>everyone who responds to me saying that i'm wrong is the same person
I'm not that anon

Anonymous 23629

>>23614
Unless you're living in isolation and never see a doctor the people caring for you and taking you to doctors appointments are going to know when you start exhibiting increased forgetfulness before the dementia progresses to the stage where you're unable to do things like feed yourself.

Anonymous 23630

>>23629
yeah, that's the point. the people caring for you are the ones who know what's happening to you (you don't), and they have to be the ones to make the decision to euthanize. so if you've expressed sentiments like 'i would rather die than forget everyone i love and be a burden on them' in the past, it's up to them to carry through with those wishes, because you won't necessarily understand what is happening to you or why.
The case mentioned in >>23575 isn't necessarily a 'moment of lucidity'. It's a moment of waking up in a hospital, totally bewildered, while people you don't know are administering an injection of an unknown substance into your veins and you have no idea why. Anyone would resist in that situation.


[Return] [Catalog]
[ Rules / FAQ ] [ meta / b / media / img / feels / hb / x ]