Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill in WA letter to paper
Filed on 15 October 2019 in Food For Thought category. 
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letter to The West Australian but as yet not printed. I might send again with as the debate goes on.
Re Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill in WA
The Code of Medicine is to save life and not to kill. Palliative Care specialists know that no one need die in pain, yet pain is the constant chorus of those pushing for killing to be a solution.
Medically assisted killing is not necessary. As a society we must not break, we must not destroy this foundational Code of Medicine to ease the way, but never to kill.
Consequences of passing the bill include giving state approval for death as a valid option, that suicide is OK if things get too tough. This is not a message to give our children.
Further, as history has shown, assisted dying will be sought or expected to include the disabled, the suicidal teen with an abuse history, the marginalised, the bereaved elderly.
We must not go down a state approved pathway of permission or expectation of the vulnerable that they should agree to be killed for the sake of others or the state.
The chorus of those pushing for assistance with what they believe is a solution is really all about them! Yes, it is painful to loose a loved one but it’s seems more about the observers pain that is driving this bill and is not the solution in soliciting the aid of another to do so by law! No one person, especially a doctor should be above the law to make a law to give special exemption to the already established law that forbids taking another’s life!!!