Boston, Mass., Apr 14, 2012 / 15:06 pm
Efforts are underway to fight a Massachusetts ballot initiative that would allow doctors to assist patients in ending their lives.
“There’s nothing dignified about suicide,” said the Massachusetts Alliance Against Doctor-Prescribed Suicide, “and there’s nothing compassionate about encouraging it or presenting it as a rational alternative.”
The alliance argued that “encouraging self-destruction” is completely unnecessary when “hospice and palliative care are common and highly developed.”
Supporters of assisted suicide have succeeded in placing a measure to legalize doctor-prescribed suicide on the 2012 ballot in Massachusetts.
The initiative would allow physicians to prescribe lethal drugs to patients with terminal conditions seeking to end their lives.