My wife helped a friend die in Germany 10 years ago. He'd acquired some cyanide, which resulted in a long, protracted death because he took too much and vomited most of it up. It was messy, painful and traumatic, but she sat with him until the end.

When someone is determined enough to die, they find a way.

Terrible to read he still suffered a lot. I hope your wife is ok.

I've read about four or five stories in my lifetime about people who assisted in aiding a dear friend. Most of them just stuffed a pillow in their face when they begged to end their very painful existence.

I've witnessesed my brother in law suffer immensly from cancer before he decided to end it all by assisted death. Near the end he was not human anymore for me. Just a body chock full of medicines constantly trying to survive as much as possible. I can't blame the cells trying to win that desperate war, but it was horrifying to watch him transition from a strong happy human to that state.

That's wild, because in my understanding it's an indictable offence to aid and abet someone to end their own lives in Canada. Like more than 10 years jail

https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/c-46/section-241.ht...

Counselling or aiding suicide

    241 (1) Everyone is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term of not more than 14 years who, whether suicide ensues or not,

        (a) counsels a person to die by suicide or abets a person in dying by suicide; or

        (b) aids a person to die by suicide.

The document goes on to detail the medical exemptions we're talking about here. What's the law in Germany?

I doubt GP's friend was really considering the law in that circumstance.

She didn't care, and she got away with it. And if she were still alive today, I wouldn't be talking about it since the statute of limitations is not passed.

Also this was in Germany, but still just as illegal.

She was the most amazing and remarkable woman I ever met. There will be an Arte documentary about her early next year (not about this; about her work in Ukraine).

I heard a first hand account of someone help their father with last stage cancer administer a morphine drip, everyone said their goodbyes and he went to sleep. Only to wake up hours later and say, it is working and they both struggled to milk the bag to increase the flow, they talked for 20 minutes while they both tried to "fix it" and he finally went back to sleep for the last time.

We need a humane way to treat humans.

> Where they can't afford the medication, or no medication seems to work, or they have an addiction problem and there just isn't any way for them to get into a treatment program

I would consider two of these absolutely monstrous reasons to assist someone in killing themselves. A broken society opting into killing its citizens because it can’t be arsed with fixing itself is next level evil

> A broken society

I don't think this is necessarily broken by any reasonable standard. If no medication exists, that's not "broken society". Nor is there not being money to give a bespoke treatment to everyone, no matter how expensive it is. If that's broken, no society in history has ever not been broken. Which is just a poor definition.

Yeah I wonder how people who say this stuff feel about the homeless? How do they feel about tax increase to fix "broken society"?

We feel fine. The ones against taxes never cared and pay the least proportion.

This is vs them talk is honestly pointless. You don't speak for anyone but yourself.

You're getting downvoted, but honestly, I agree with you.

That said, I don't have any actual insight into the process; I was just extemporizing. So if it sounds fucked up, that's because _I_ fucked up and didn't think long enough about circumstances where someone would be approved for MAID instead of offered other solutions. It's entirely possible and indeed likely that if you can't afford medication or treatment, there's options in place to get that to you instead of approving your MAID appointment.

Please don't judge Canada too harshly just because I misspoke. =)

It’s all good, I didn’t take your comment as an indication of how it actually functions in Canada. Just reacting to the implications of your examples

- It’s a fact of life that people die.

- Some of those deaths are suicides.

- It is pure fantasy to imagine we can have a society with 0 suicides (when accounting scale, complexity and size).

The choice then becomes: help, or punish.

It is absolutely monstrous to punish, and helping does not mean killing every Tom, Dick and Harry with a case of the Monday blues.

B.s. parent literally gave an example of someone that got access to MAID a week after their doc visit. I’ve changed my mind on things after a month. Not saying MAID is bad or should be banned. I’m saying people will 100 percent abuse the system. My concern is healthcare system practiioners. I am dealing with a ton of people whose job it is to press our family into a decision we don’t want to make. This includes an md, a social worker and a care coordinator. Canadas health care for old people and folks with dementia is a disgrace. Maid should not have to be the only option with dignity.

What’s another dignified option when it reaches terminal?

Accepting suffering as part of the human condition. In the Christian faith, Christians are taught that suffering is part of life and good things can result from it. Like what? Empathy, love, and compassion from caregivers, friends, and family to the suffering person. Also, the suffering person may express love to those around them. Jesus allowed himself to be crucified and suffered one of the most horrible deaths imaginable. He did it as an act of love for humanity. A Christian might argue that it was also to serve as an example of enduring suffering.

And you and anyone else can still opt to live and suffer if you see value in it. The beauty of freedom is that you can do you, and nobody can force their beliefs on you.

I would also caution with the old adage, don't knock it till you try it. Life in extreme pain is no life at all. Calling on Jesus isn't going to suddenly make excruciating pain more bearable, especially for someone who doesn't believe in Jesus. Maybe toughing it out for a few more weeks or months is worth extra presents in heaven, but unless we have some evidence of that, I think it would be grossly irresponsible, indeed evil, to legislate it. It is, in my opinion the equivalence of torture.

I accept your suffering if you choose so. If I knew you personally, I would even do all I could to help and comfort you. However, I cannot condone you imposing suffering on others in the name of YOUR religion.

I never said anything about me wanting to impose my religious belief on others.

Christians can suffer as much as they like. To everyone their weirdness.

Just don't push it to others under the name of morality out other bullshit.

I would like to be able to die when I want to, in a simple and painless way. Because I will do it anyway jumping under a train or lorry it is just messy for everyone.

Your life doesn't belong to you. You need to reread the Phaedo.

I never said anything about imposing my beliefs on others. I merely responded to the question about whether there was any other course when things are terminal.

But it is. Most people are not rich to pay for their own care. Society doesn't want tax increases. We don't have enough healthcare workers.

Reality doesn't care about how things should be.

Society != a small but influential wealthy minority

Framing it as unchangeable "reality" is intellectually dishonest.

Run a political party on a "unlimited spending on healthcare" platform and see how far you get.

> I’ve changed my mind on things after a month

...and what is the implication here? After I broke a bone, I was given a choice between surgery and a cast. I chose surgery - which cant be undone - and I half regretted it when I bumped into things and the titanium bits transferred the force straight the bone, resulting in exquisite pain. Should I have been denied surgery because it can't be undone? I think not, I was given the choice, I hose what I thought was best. Did I make the correct choice? Probably not, but it was my choice to make, and expecting a system with 0% regret rate is impossible.

It’s strange to me how resistant society is to the idea that mental health is health. Not all there is to health, but someone suffering from terminal cancer is typically regarded very differently from someone suffering from an incurable mental illness.

Not every mental illness makes someone of unsound mind.

I see no difference between a case of someone who does not wish continue because of some incurable mental health issue that makes their life hell, and someone who does not wish to continue due to e.g. terminal cancer.