tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1054910627465846465.post4604212631961383580..comments2024-03-28T15:30:35.153-07:00Comments on The Hitchhiker's Guide to National Affairs: California's Slippery SlopeUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1054910627465846465.post-53570564390127346052015-10-31T19:01:22.361-07:002015-10-31T19:01:22.361-07:00I agree that laws legalizing PAS often do not do e...I agree that laws legalizing PAS often do not do enough to regulate the practice to ensure that the decision to end one's life is completely independent and not influenced by anyone else. For example, in Oregon, where PAS was first legalized in the US, a cancer patient, Barbara Wagner, found out that she could receive life prolonging treatment for her cancer, but that her insurance plan wouldn't cover this treatment. However, her insurance would actually cover physician assisted suicide. In addition, the Oregon law has been criticized for not having adequate safeguards to protect mentally ill people or the elderly from either themselves or coercive family members. <br /><br />I agree with Scott that the controversy surrounding PAS isn't necessarily a flaw in bureaucracy or insurance companies, but rather has to do with how people see life, death, and personal autonomy. For example, people are generally more willing to accept someone choosing to take themselves off of life support, but people are less willing to accept this concept a step further in PAS, or to an extreme extent, euthanasia, which is why people either don't want to legalize PAS or want the law to give more safeguards and prevent any slippery slope. Huayu Ouyanghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11946086515685368427noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1054910627465846465.post-84115747638084325952015-10-24T03:40:43.605-07:002015-10-24T03:40:43.605-07:00I think there is another facet often associated wi...I think there is another facet often associated with the 'slippery slope' argument, which is the expansion of PAS to the likes seen in Belgium and some states in the EU. On the other side of the pond in Belgium, PAS has been extended to children as of last year (http://time.com/7565/belgium-euthanasia-law-children-assisted-suicide/). Many people also worry that PAS is the beginning of a slippery slope to euthanasia, and I'll take this moment to make the distinction (just in case). Euthanasia is when the doctor administers the lethal drug (he plunges the syringe and pushes the plunger) and PAS is when the doctor writes a prescription for a lethal dose of barbiturates and the patient SELF-ADMINISTERS it (he swallows the pills of his own volition and doing). I do believe, however, that the pressure that insurance exerts on an individual in that situation isn't so formal in terms of coverage. Thanks to the ACA, insurance companies are not allowed to discriminate in terms of coverage, but the looming medical bill of palliative care (treatment of symptoms over the disease) does generate potential informal pressures. This quickly leads to the question of whether or not these individuals are even qualified to accept PAS due to the infinite possibilities for outside influences to be affecting their decision: the idea that there is no truly independent decision. That being said, I don't think the bureaucracy is at fault here, but our society's taboo on death is. The bureaucracy does what it can to manage the procedural exploitation, but at some point we as a people will have to confront the skeletons in the closet.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00055831811919473345noreply@blogger.com