Voluntary euthanasia is back in the political spotlight. The Greens have used their stronger position in the new parliament to raise the issue of people’s right to choose how and when they die.
A 1995 Ray Morgan research poll said 78% of people supported voluntary euthanasia being made legal in Australia. In 2009, a Newspoll survey said 85% of Australians supported voluntary euthanasia laws.
Despite this support for euthanasia legalisation, the Labor party and the Liberal/National coalition have blocked the issue for many years. In 1997, the federal parliament overturned laws allowing voluntary euthanasia in the Northern Territory.
Greens leader Bob Brown announced legislation on September 23 that would remove the federal government’s ban on the Northern Territory’s euthanasia laws. But this may not result in voluntary euthanasia being legalised there. NT Chief Minister Paul Henderson said euthanasia legislation was not a priority, ABC Online said on September 22.
Dr Philip Nitschke, a euthanasia campaigner and director of Exit International, told Green Left Weekly: “The passage of Bob Brown's bill isn't going to make much difference other than getting people talking about the issue, and it’s been very successful at that.”
Greens MPs have also introduced bills in South Australia, Tasmania, Western Australia and New South Wales state parliaments. The Western Australian bill was defeated in the parliament on September 23, with 24 votes in favour and 11 against.
“I wouldn't be surprised if we see legislation in one state or other within the year or sooner, and that's going to put immense pressure on other states”, Nitschke said.
“In South Australia they've had five attempts [at passing euthanasia laws] over the past decade. So sooner or later one is going to pass and it could well be this one. The other one with a good chance of passing is in Tasmania where you've got the Greens in coalition with Labor, so the government is more likely to take notice of the Greens than they would normally.”
Opposition to voluntary euthanasia has come from religious institutions that invoke the “sanctity of life” to deny people the right to end their lives with dignity and avoid suffering from incurable medical conditions.
For example, in September 2008, Pope Benedict XVI restated the Catholic church’s opposition to euthanasia and said people should have “the grace to accept, without fear or bitterness, to leave this world at the hour chosen by God”.
This is despite many opinion polls showing that a majority of members of these institutions support some form of euthanasia legislation. For example, in 2002, a Morgan poll in South Australia found 74% of Catholics supported voluntary euthanasia and other religious denominations had similar levels of support.
The Australian Medical Association has also opposed voluntary euthanasia. AMA national president Dr Andrew Pesce told Therecord.com.au on September 15: “Doctors should not have to do anything where the only intention is to end life.”
But doctors often covertly practise “slow euthanasia” on the terminally ill, usually by gradually increasing the dose of pain-killing drugs until the patient dies.
Nitschke told GLW he thought the idea that doctors cannot be involved in ending life was false. “The idea that you do everything you can for a patient but as soon as you get to the one issue that really matters to them you just turn your back and walk away and say ‘I can do everything but I cant do that’ — that doesn’t sit comfortably with my understanding of compassionate medical care.
“I am sympathetic in one way — I'm not too sure the doctors should be making the decision, yet in all of the legislative models by and large you have to present yourself to a panel of doctors to be approved. I don't think doctors should be given that power, I think it should be some other authority.
“For all the troubles [with the proposed laws], they're still a whole lot better than what we’ve got now. There will be enough doctors who will break ranks [with the AMA], who will see it as a reasonable part of patient care.”
On September 10, pro-euthanasia television and billboard advertisements made by Exit International were banned by regulator Commercials Advice.
Nitschke said the television ad was rejected a second time on September 21. “We put in an amended script for a second ad, which was a very tiny piece of the original, saying if you want to see the whole ad you have to go to this website.
“But that's been deemed to be in breach of the guidelines too, as it’s directing someone to a website or billboard which they claim is promoting suicide. I don't think it promotes suicide, but they’re saying it does. It seems to be an abuse of regulatory powers. This is a body that is set up by the commercial television industry to self-regulate and there seems to be almost no accountability.”
Nitschke said legal options were being explored to appeal the decision. He also said an identical version of the ad had been accepted in Canada, and an approach had been made for screenings in Italy.
The current debate focuses on the rights of terminally ill people, but Nitschke said there is also a bigger human rights issue at stake.
“People say to me increasingly: ‘I make the decision about whether I live or die, it’s not up to other people and I want to know that I've got that choice’. Exit International is increasingly moving towards making sure every elderly person has that option, and sickness is really not a necessary criteria.
“These days I don’t question people that come along who are of sound mind and over a certain age and say they want to die — I think they should have the wherewithal to take that step. We shouldn’t be trying to set some arbitrary standards that satisfy us, it should be left entirely to the decision of the individual.
“That's become something I'm quite passionate about and as we have this great number of aging baby-boomers getting into their twilight years, I can see it becoming a cutting edge social issue.”