Senate Bill 579 eliminates physician-assisted suicide waiting periods for those diagnosed as near death. The Oregon House passed the bill 35-22 yesterday. It will now become law unless the governor vetoes it.
“The Legislature heard from highly qualified and experienced medical professionals who testified that this bill is not only unnecessary but dangerous,” says Lois Anderson, ORTL executive director. “They voted largely down party lines to fulfill the ominous agenda of a handful of their colleagues.”
The journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings, in a November 2005 article, printed that survival predictions were made, as part of a study, for 468 patients in hospice programs. Only 20 percent of the predictions were accurate.
“While it is incredibly hard for physicians to accurately prognosticate someone’s life expectancy,” says Anderson, “It is not incredibly hard for a person in a position of influence to bully a sick person into obtaining lethal drugs. Eliminating the waiting period will make this even easier.”
