Ill right-to-die activist sheds greater attention on physician-assisted suicide

Insight

Brittany Maynard, a 29-year-old with terminal brain cancer, has brought the issue of physician assisted suicide into the spotlight again after making a viral video. Maynard moved from California to Oregon to take advantage of Oregon’s “death with dignity” law. CCTV America’s Chris Casquejo reports from Portland, Oregon.

With more than eight million views, Brittany Maynard is a YouTube phenomenon. Unlike most people, she knows when she will die: November 1st. She knows the date because she’s picked out the date herself.

“I plan to be surrounded by my immediate family, which is my husband, and my mother, and my stepfather, and my best friend, who’s also a physician,” said Maynard. “And probably not much more people.”

When doctors discovered a large tumor in her brain, they told her she had up to ten more years to live. But more tests showed Brittany’s cancer was more deadly, and far more advanced.

“That was a major shock to my system, and the system of my family, because it went potentially from having years of time to being told I had, like, six months,” Maynard explained.

She wanted to choose where and when she died, but that’s illegal in her home state of California, so she and her family moved to Oregon where in 1997, it became the first U.S. state to legalize physician-assisted suicide in cases where a person has fewer than six months to live.

Five U.S. states have legalized PAS:

  1. Oregon (1994)
  2. Washington (2008)
  3. Montana (2009)
  4. Vermont (2013)
  5. New Mexico (2014)

People with disabilities are among the staunchest opponents of assisted suicide. An advocacy group for the disabled, called “Not Dead Yet”, says assisted-suicide and euthanasia are “deadly forms of discrimination against old, ill, and disabled people.”

In 2007, a cancer-stricken Australian doctor named John Elliott made a video explaining why he wanted to take his own life. His wife said they had to fly to Switzerland where he could end his life legally.

“Can you imagine if your vet would tell you, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t help your suffering animal. This is out of the question. Take him to the other side of the world,'” said John’s wife, Angelika Elliott. “What would you say? You would scream! All the animal lovers would scream.”

According to the Journal of Medical Ethics, a total of 611 “tourists” from 31 countries flew to Switzerland to end their lives between 2008 and 2012.

At least six countries have nationally legalized what is considered either active euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide. China and the U.S. are not among them.

Countries with Legalized Euthanasia or PAS:

  1. The Netherlands (2002) [euthanasia or PAS]
  2. Switzerland (1942) [PAS]
  3. Belgium (2002) [euthanasia]
  4. Luxembourg [euthanasia]
  5. Albania (1999) [euthanasia]
  6. Colombia (2010) [PAS]

Maynard has been traveling to places she wants to see before she dies, such as Machu Picchu in Peru and Alaska. She also wants to share her beliefs and has asked the Denver-based advocacy group Compassion & Choices to help.

An Oregon lawmaker and doctor said the law’s intent is to give power to patients while they’re still healthy enough to exercise it.

“They don’t have to wonder: ‘When is the end going to come? Am I going to be able to communicate with my loved ones before I die?’ They can make that choice,” said Oregon lawmaker Elizabeth Steiner Hayward.

George Eighmey.Still001

When she feels ready, Maynard will take the life-ending pills.

“It’s in a safe spot. I know that it’s there when I need it,” said Maynard. She will die in the bed she shares with her husband.

One wish Maynard is unlikely to get, however, is a U.S. federal law permitting others to end their lives like she intends to do.

About half of U.S. states have defeated bills to legalize physician-assisted suicide or have banned it outright.

For more insight into the legal side of end-of-life care, CCTV America interviewed George Eighmey, a former Oregon state legislator and a board member at the Death with Dignity National Center.