With assisted suicide he may have been more closely monitored. Who knows.

I doubt it. It might have reduced the numbers he killed as some of the more frail ones might have taken the assisted route instead.

You're comparing people who choose not to suffer a slow painful death, to a mass murderer?
That's just wrong on so many levels.

What I'm saying is that happened under the current system, it has nothing to do with assisted deaths.

You misunderstand entirely. I'm not comparing what Shipman did to what a designated relative might do under such regulation in any sense at all. The point is if we had the 'assisted suicide' rules, and if the doctor could also be the witness to the 'statement of intent to relinquish life' as we may call it would likely have been very, very hard to convict Shipman of anything at all. He could have got his victims to mistakenly sign the statement before he killed them. He could have killed them and faked the statement afterwards - he faked prescriptions to get the drugs he injected his victims with. Most of the people he killed were old and frail and thus a lax system of checking would likely not bother examining the circumstances too stringently. However if someone else had to be the declaration witness each time, he wouldn't be able to hide behind the 'assisted suicide' regulations.

I'm not saying the people who might help relatives in this regard are serial killers. I'm saying if you have a system, you have to have it work in such a way as it can't be abused by someone like Shipman. If one person handles the whole process, it's open to abuse.

Jon

I am not disagreeing with you. Shipman was an abhorant individual and nothing to do with assisted suicide. I was just commentating that some may have take the alternative route of assisted suicide.