{"id":392,"date":"2009-03-02T19:20:42","date_gmt":"2009-03-02T19:20:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/?p=392"},"modified":"2025-09-30T02:16:15","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T02:16:15","slug":"fr-jonathan-morris-on-further-steps-toward-euthanasia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/?p=392","title":{"rendered":"Fr. Jonathan Morris on further steps toward euthanasia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fr. Jonathan Morris, among other things, is a contributor to FOX News<\/strong>. He's writing about the new Washington State law allowing for assisted suicide. This is from his FOX blog. Hit the link to read the whole article.<\/p>\n

A Big Step Toward Widespread Euthanasia \u00ab FOX Forum \u00ab FOXNews.com<\/font><\/a><\/p>\n

\n

…if we scratch the surface, the whole scenario starts to get very messy. First, the new Washington law prohibits doctors from documenting their patient\u2019s real cause of death if it is from doctor-prescribed drugs \u2014 even when they are certain the patient has taken them.  Instead, doctors must certify the cause of death as the patient\u2019s original illness.  Yes, in Washington, what rational people would consider malpractice\u2013lying about the cause of death\u2013is now required by law.<\/p>\n

<\/span>This is a perfect example of the Machiavellian politics surrounding state laws that oblige citizens to subject truth (in this case medical science) to convenience, for whatever sordid reason.   According to the law\u2019s supporters, the reason for this measure is to protect a patient\u2019s right to privacy (apparently, an absolute right that in this case trumps even transparency).  As it turns out, this stipulation in the law makes things very convenient for the of the euthanasia movement.  Without this end-of-life documentation, it is impossible to produce definitive data about how many people will have used doctor-prescribed drugs to end their lives in the Evergreen State.<\/p>\n

The second great reason for concern is the increasing financial benefits assisted suicide laws provide to strapped state budgets and to HMOs.  Even before our current financial crisis, there was already evidence that patients in Oregon had been offered free suicide drugs as a less costly alternative to expensive healing or palliative medicines.  A case in point was Barbara Wagner, a 64-year-old Oregon resident, who was informed last May that her cancer had returned.  Her doctor prescribed a new drug that could extend her life, but Oregon\u2019s Medicaid program sent her a form letter saying it would not cover the cost of the drugs.   In the same unsigned letter she was also offered information about an affordable alternative: Medicaid would cover \u201ccomfort care\u201d, including \u201cphysician aid in dying\u201d (the lethal drugs would have cost the state less than $100).  Barbara died in October, but first left this moving video<\/font><\/a>, pleading with the voters of Washington state not to let the same thing happen to them. Eventually, the director of Oregon\u2019s Medicaid program admitted the organization sends such letters to patients whom they think have little chance of surviving.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fr. Jonathan Morris, among other things, is a contributor to FOX News. He's writing about the new Washington State law allowing for assisted suicide. This is from his FOX blog. Hit the link to read the whole article. A Big Step Toward Widespread Euthanasia \u00ab FOX Forum \u00ab FOXNews.com …if we scratch the surface, the whole scenario […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=392"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":936,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392\/revisions\/936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}