Disability Rights and Independent Living Center Advocates Once Again Oppose Assisted Suicide in Assembly Appropriations Committee Wednesday


SACRAMENTO, Calif., April 17 /PRNewswire/ -- Advocates from
organizations representing people with disabilities and independent living
centers will once again be at the Capitol to help defeat AB 374, a bill
legalizing physician- assisted suicide in California that is set to be
voted on by the Assembly Appropriations Committee, Wednesday, April 18th.
The Independent Living Center of San Francisco wrote, "We strongly
oppose the legalization of assisted suicide in California because
individuals, including those with disabilities, do not have access to
sufficient medical care ... Without true choices in care, individuals who
have unmet medical needs, insufficient finances to cover necessary care or
who feel they are or will be a burden to their loved ones could be forced
into choosing to end their life."
FREED Center for Independent Living argues against assisted suicide in
their position that, "Proponents do not make the connection between
assisted suicide and the lack of adequate health services, but to ignore
this connection is to miss the point ... Medical costs are soaring and
access to needed care is stretching further beyond the reach of many.
People with disabilities who require a significant level of health care
services are the most likely subjects of assisted suicide discussions."
For those under the misguided impression that this legislation only
applies to "terminal" patients, we refer you to a letter from the
California Hospice and Palliative Care Association to the Senate Judiciary
Committee regarding assisted suicide,
Diagnosing a terminal illness is not an exact science. Studies have
confirmed that prognostic error in the case of terminal illness occurs
frequently. In a study of 365 doctors and 504 hospice patients conducted
by Nicholas Christakis at the University of Chicago, only 20% of
prognoses were accurate. Data available from the Office of Statewide
Health Planning and Development (OSHPD) shows that in 2004, 700 hospice
patients were discharged "live" because they no longer met the hospice
eligibility criteria of having less than six months to live.
For more information about the diverse coalition of organizations
aligned against physician-assisted suicide,

this is very hurtful subject to me because~ I love people

I am against ethnic cleansing and killing the profoundly disabled...
the old man who was shot to death at VA. tech, was a "Holocaust survivor"..

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/...y-Shooting.php
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Related links:

http://www.CA-AAS.com/