A good point - well made.

If only it were either true or relevant...

Ah yes, I forget that this is a country only populated by yourself and so there aren't any other opinions to be considered. Does make the logistics so much easier doesn't it.

A patient can refuse treatment. A relative did this a couple of year's ago. She had MS and because she was bed-ridden a leg had gone gangrenous. The treatment was amputation. She refused this, and eventually died.

The question of doctors not helping in assisted deaths due to the sanctity if life seems pretty shallow to me if a patient can refuse life-saving treatment and have those views respected. In the example I gave, the patient effectively said that she wanted to die. By not giving the necessary treatment, the doctors were as guilty of her death as if they had filled her with an overdose of painkillers.

I would also argue that a doctor, being a human being, could make a far better judge of a fellow human's suffering than he could than a vet could decide about a cat or dog's suffering, yet as noted here before, a vet can take the life of an animal with no direct consultation with the animal concerned.

Yet a human being, who is conscious, lucid and fully aware if his predicament and who wants to end it, or even discuss the conditions where life can be ended is denied that decision simply because of the colly-wobbles suffered by some over sensitive types.

This isn't just respecting a patient's decision. It's enshrined in law, under the Mental Capacity Act (I believe). If you have, say, a chest infection and need antibiotics, provided the infection hasn't caused your judgement to become clouded, you can accept or decline the antibiotics. You cannot demand them. Nor can I pin you down and jab you with them. Similarly, with your relative, we can't enforce treatment, even if she would die as a consequence.

No they weren't, as explained above. The alternative would have been for the doctors to break the law. Which brings us back to assisted suicide - it's still breaking the law.


And how, pray tell, would the vet consult with the animal?

They can't. That's his point.