British Section of the World Federation of Doctors Who Respect Human Life

Baroness Hollis of Heigham, a Work and Pensions minister, has told Parliament that the current ratio of 3-4 working people per retired person in England and,Wales would fall to around 2-4 by 2030, and that "an increase in the birth rate would help to reduce any future demographic pressure on the National Insurance Fund" (Written Answers, House of Lords, Hansard, 30 July 02, quoted in SPUC News. Paul Tully, SPUC's General Secretary, commented: " This is perhaps the first realisation by this government that the decline in births, caused by the culture of abortion and population control, threatens the welfare state." But RU 486, the human pesticide, and the "morning-after pill" are still being officially promoted.

The Glasgow Sunday Herald, 24 Sept 02, reported that the 10-yearly census, to be published soon, registered a drop in Scotland's population, "the number falling as a result of emigration and one of the lowest birthrates in the world." The response of the Scottish Executive was to launch a campaign against racism, so as to encourage immigration. This hit the headlines, while the reason for it was forgotten.

"The Oregon Dept. of Human Services (ODHS) has released its fourth annual report on the practice of physician-assisted suicide in 2001, and once again, flaws in the reporting system as well as incomplete data raise serious doubts about Oregon s positive assessment of this induced-death practice (International Task Force Update, 2002, Vol. 16. No. 1).

...''This law does not penalise doctors who fail to report assisted suicide deaths, and ODHS has no authority to enforce the reporting requirement... The actual statistics for physician non-compliance or any other abuse of the assisted suicide law will never be known".

"It's time that Oregon health officials admit they really don't know what the hell is going on in Oregon" says Stephen Drake, research analyst for Not Dead Yet (quoted in Nancy Valko's news service). "All the data so far is a simple reporting of the subjective opinions of health professionals directly involved in facilitating the suicides of individuals in Oregon. This is essentially 'junk science'."

"Oregon's major party candidates for governor say the current. chief executive should apologise for the state's forced sterilisation of 2,650 people over 66 years" (The Oregonian, 31st July 02, quoted by Nancy Valko). The 1917 law allowing it was abrogated in 1983. "Bill Lynch of the Oregon Council of Developmental Disabilities, and Michael Bailey who has a daughter with Down's Syndrome, said the organisations they represent are not seeking monetary damages., Instead they want a public apology to acknowledge what happened to victims the most of whom were in state institutions - and to correct the historical record and to affirm basic human rights." It now appears that the records of the Board of Eugenics have been shredded, in contravention of state law.

"Nancy Crick, the Gold Coast grandmother whose determination to end her life made her a cause célèbre of euthanasia supporters, in death has provided a. compelling reason for many to be uneasy with this practice..." (Daily Telegraph of Australia, 28 May 02).

"The almost carnival atmosphere as Mrs. Crick drank a concoction of poisons bordered on the bizarre, and the enthusiasm of euthanasia groups over her right to do so was offensive." At autopsy it was found that Mrs.Crick had a twisted bowel, but was not suffering from any form of cancer. Dr. Philip Nitschke, Australia's leading euthanasiast, declared she was right to kill herself anyway.

In the Canberra Times of 28 May 02 Michael Cook wrote: "The big losers from legalised euthanasia will be ailing elderly women ... The more publicity euthanasia receives though stunts like Nancy Crick's death, the more we foster negative attitudes about old age and disability. More and more grandmothers will think their families would be better off without them. Instead of a campaign for mercy killing, we need a campaign for merciful care..."

After a recent trial, the Luton Herald and Post, reported "A judge's decision to let a man who killed his terminally ill wife walk free from court has been called into question in the light of the high profile court case fought by Luton's Diane Pretty" (who was refused permission for her husband to kill her). Deborah Annetts, chief executive of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society, claimed, "The government cannot go on ignoring back-street suicides and mercy killings", but should introduce "medical help to die."

"The verdict of 'suicide' would be scrapped -under sweeping plans to overhaul coroners' powers and death certification procedures published today," The Times reported on 30 Aug 02. "The term, which has been used for at least three centuries, would be replaced by the more neutral phrase 'death by own actions'. The move is part of a wider plan to scrap obsolete verdicts and to end the stigma attached to the word suicide."

How odd that a review of coroner services which was set up after the conviction of Dr. Harold Shipman should apparently aim to promote even more unnatural deaths.

"In the early twentieth century, there were some individuals who broke from their-peers and viewed suicide as something other than a result of mental illness. For example in 1919 Alfred Hoche wrote of balance-sheet suicide, in which a person could weigh the pros and cons of living and decide that death was preferable." This comes from a book published in the U.S.A. entitled "Rational Suicide, Implications for Health Care Professionals", by James Werth, chair of the Hemlock Society's mental. health advisory committee and a national board member of Death with Dignity. "What Werth fails to mention," Nancy Valko comments, is "that Hoche' s major claim to fame is his coauthorising of the infamous 'Permitting the Destruction of Unworthy Life, 'which became a blueprint for the Nazis systematic extermination of people with physical, intellectual and psychiatric disabilities."

The Annual Conference of the American Psychological Association in August 2002, featured an all-day workshop on "end of life" issues led by James Werth. Disability activist from Not Dead Yet picketed the conference.

"Informed consent and choice are just words used to justify killing people who are not considered worth the resources needed to support them," commented Diane Coleman, chair of Not Dead. Yet, after Britain's "Miss B" case.

"Just as there is no such thing as a free lunch, there is no such thing as free choice," said Carol Cleigh NDY's Treasurer. "'All choices are made in a socio-cultural context which devalues the lives of people with disabilities. Ideology such as Werth's only serves to further devalue our lives."