Euthanasia is not . . . "safe."

It's anything but safe.

I hadn’t planned to address euthanasia this soon, but recent events brought it to the forefront. Especially since euthanasia is the opposite of “surviving dying.”

Upfront disclosure: I am a Christian opposed to euthanasia. I am also a physician opposed to euthanasia. I took an oath to preserve life, not end it. But in the past, I was wrong to think a limited use of euthanasia was acceptable in certain circumstances.

So that you know I understand the reasons behind the practice, you need look no farther than my essay in the Archives of Family Medicine after the death of my beloved grandmother. Seeing her suffer from terminal brain cancer, I wished for a syringe of morphine to end her pain.

The editor wisely asked me to rewrite the piece, and suggested I explore why I wanted to do that. The article improved. I provided suggestions on palliative care to help those dealing with dying family members, and how our systems should be changed to prevent families from being put in the situation my family was.

(“All the Colors of the Mango,” R.L. Wells, Archives of Family Medicine, 1995, Sep;4(9):752-3 is available to read here: All the Colors of the Mango)

I’m ashamed to say at the time I concluded euthanasia (death with dignity), for those in my grandmother’s position, was acceptable.

I’ve matured since then.

Grandma Essie’s death was my first, hands-on family death. I’ve gone through many more family members and friend’s deaths.

My conclusions now are the opposite.

A noble “death with dignity” is a myth. Nothing about death is pretty. I will spare you the gory details of what happens to your body after you die, but decay sets in immediately. No matter who you are, nor how you die.

A true noble death is when one sacrifices their life to save another—the selfless soldier who falls on a grenade to protect his squad. The mother who steps in front of a child to take a bullet. A stranger who runs into a burning house to rescue a family but doesn’t make it back out himself.

Lying down on a comfy couch and allowing a medical professional to inject poison to kill you isn’t dignified. The corpse will react the same.

This may anger some of the opposite persuasion, but I now believe euthanasia takes the easy way out.

Thirty years ago, I wanted that easy way out. The "suffering” I wanted to end was not my grandmother’s—it was MINE. My grief and pain at watching her die. Watching my parents and aunt and uncle grieve. All the time and effort we spent to care for Grandma, who was given six weeks and survived eight months.

She could never have chosen euthanasia for herself, because the brain tumor caused a stroke, which led to her diagnosis but rendered her mute. The bleed was in the area of the brain that controls speech, so she could respond at first in halting sentences, which quickly devolved into single words, then nothing at all.

Caring for Grandma brought us together as a family and forced us to deal with long-standing issues that needed to be addressed. My young children learned loved ones aren’t permanent, so we need to treat them well.

I learned patience, a trait many physicians lack.

I watched a couple in their seventies deal with Lou Gehrig’s disease. The husband’s room was across the hall in the skilled nursing facility from my dad’s room. I saw a loving, elderly wife arrive early in the morning, stay until dark, caring for her husband, feeding him, cleaning him, and reading to him.

If there’s a case to be made for euthanasia, Lou Gehrig’s disease would be near the top. (Same disease physicist Stephen Hawking had)

One dies by inches, perhaps millimeters. The husband had chosen not to go on a ventilator nor have a feeding tube, but he was lucid when he signed those papers. The fatigue was etched in his wife’s wrinkles when she smiled. She had amazing stamina, but what impressed me most was the determined love she demonstrated for her lifelong partner.

And one day, he simply wasn’t there.

They were people of faith, as we had talked about it. What sustained that wife was a beautiful, unconditional love. Her love of God, and love for her husband.

Families can allow deaths to tear them apart, or they can proceed along the harder path of heart-to-heart conversations, sharing stories, forgiving, and reconciliation.

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Euthanasia is the opposite of “safe.”

Zoraya ter Beek

A recent case of a lovely Dutch woman who ended her life by euthanasia in May has been in the news, mostly because Zoraya did not have a terminal illness. She had psychiatric issues of autism, chronic depression and borderline personality disorder.

In fact, she had a history of suicide attempts. Even at the time of her euthanasia, she expressed suicidal thoughts.

In the end, the Dutch government legally helped her to complete her suicide.

By comparison to those in third-world poverty, Zoraya had a good lifestyle. A loving boyfriend, two cats, many friends, and residing in a wealthy European country with ample social benefits. One might ask what more did she need?

Hope and faith.

Her uncertainty about life after death or not is quoted in many articles. In one, she tells people she’s going to die, and to not wish her a safe journey because she’s not going anywhere after her death—that will be it.

In another interview, Zoraya expressed concern about dying (this alone should have precluded official euthanasia) and wondering what did lay beyond. “I’m a little afraid of dying, because it’s the ultimate unknown.”

I get why people who are ill give up. I have three active autoimmune diseases, and have had fifteen surgeries. I take a boatload of medicine, and have suffered from chronic joint and cartilage pain for decades. Some days I have trouble getting out of bed and walking. There are days I’d like to give up.

I don’t, though, because I love my family and my Christian faith teaches me a better world lies ahead. I’m still here for a reason. God continually reminds me of my need to rely on him, but also why I’m here—to help others and make a positive contribution to their lives. I’m here to point to HIM.

Faith gives hope to those who suffer. It teaches their suffering isn’t in vain because there is life after death. Zoraya even said, “But the longer the treatment goes on, you start losing hope." She had lost hope, and her doctors and the secular Dutch government didn’t have the answer she sought.

Nor did they give her any hope, which is a huge problem that stands out.

Zoraya had undergone multiple psychiatric treatments, including electroconvulsive therapy, for severe depression. In 2020, her Dutch doctors told her they could offer nothing more, which is when she applied for euthanasia. She stopped all therapy for her psychiatric disorders. Since then, we had the isolation and enforced loneliness of a pandemic.

A recent article in The Medical Letter, a respected independent journal that reviews drugs and therapies, reported on early success in using low-dose hallucinogens like LSD to treat severe depression. She went FOUR years without any treatment. That was Zoraya’s right to refuse therapy of course, but the government and physicians should have not proceeded in light of these recent discoveries of possible new treatments.

Suicide attempts and suicidal ideation are hallmark signs and symptoms of depression. Yet they still allowed euthanasia?

Zoraya’s doctors were wrong in 2020 and would be wrong now. Hope was and is on the horizon. With modern medicine, as rapidly as therapies evolve, I would not tell any patient all treatments “had been exhausted.”

The quote that struck me most was the widely quoted statement by Zoraya, talking about her upcoming euthanasia.

“But in the Netherlands, we’ve had this law for more than 20 years. There are really strict rules, and it’s really safe." Zoraya ter Beek

Clearly, Zoraya trusted her doctors, who erred, and her government, which wasn’t safe at all. It killed her. This isn’t suicide, although she chose to die.

This is homicide by the state, legalized.

Living in the Netherlands wasn’t safe for Zoraya. This young woman should’ve been told her continued existence, no matter how hard, mattered.

That she was a valued member of Dutch society.

That her doctors and the government would do everything possible to help her succeed in living.

That life isn’t measured by how you feel — it’s measured in how you contribute and help others.

Zoraya thought she was doing the right thing by advocating for euthanasia, or better state-sponsored suicide but once upon a time, she wanted to be a psychiatrist.

How much better that would have been for the Netherlands and for her.

Euthanasia is on the rise

If you look for charts on the number of euthanized patients, you see a shocking trend.

They’re soaring.

This is especially concerning because of the recent pandemic, where governments world-wide shut down and isolated their citizens for great lengths of time. One would expect the increased rates of depression. The answer isn’t to go ahead and euthanize people. I have family members with autism and depression. This isn’t something I’m not familiar with.

In 1939, the Nazis started out by killing disabled or “deformed” children, then rapidly moved on to the mentally ill. One story related how a woman with a limp was taken and killed - despite the fact she had a family, worked just fine, and had no other problems. The Nazis wanted to cleanse the Aryan race of undesirables.

One might even call them “deplorables”?

Click here: Nazi T4 program

The “utilitarian perfectionism” of the Third Reich has risen its ugly head again.

Governments no longer look at their citizens as valued members of society. They’re mere numbers. Attached to figures. “If we euthanized everyone in skilled care, just look at the Medicaid money we would save,” these bureaucrats think. The main problem with bureaucracies isn’t the red tape.

It’s the banality of evil that arises from them.

Faceless, soulless widgets who stamp paper and do their jobs (or inject poison into patients to end their lives) without questioning the morality or the laws behind it. Who go home and put up their feet at night without thinking about what their new regulation or policy might actually mean for their neighbors next door.

The MAID euthanasia program in Canada was going to expand to include solely mentally ill individuals as well, but that was put on hold in 2027. For now, MAID remains voluntary.

Does anyone trust the Trudeau government will leave it at that?

I sure don’t.