Dignity in dying

In the margins of our visit to the Surrey hills previously noticed, I attended a meeting of the West Surrey Chapter of the Dignity in Dying organisation in an upstairs room at the King William IV public house in south Albury, that is to say the establishment whose website if to be found reference 1. A busy house, doing a lot of meals and sporting a lot of Surrey accents. Plus plenty of low beams upstairs.

Maybe 15 of us there, some of whom had personal experience of these matters.

Three takeaways.

First, we were told that the Dignity in Dying people believe that the way to get change is to have a concrete proposal, rather than to have a woolly proposal which can get bashed about and brushed up during the legislative process. They seem quite firm about this, although I am not convinced myself. Partly because I believe that their requirement that you must have a life expectancy of six months or less is unnecessarily restrictive: one can be having a very unpleasant life, with no prospect of relief and with no near-term prospect of death. I also believe that the people at reference 3 do not include this particular requirement in their proposal.

The requirement for sound mind makes the position of the demented difficult, even if they have given clear instructions beforehand. No doubt we are some way off solving that one - although I once read that there are still some places in the world where people who have clearly lived too long are simply - and unexpectedly - bashed on the head. A decent enough solution, but not one that scales.

Second, we were told of a booklet which had been produced by Dignity in Dying called 'The true cost', which tells one something about the nuts and bolts of going to Dignitas in Switzerland to get one's assisted death. I managed to collar one of the samples.

The expense - around £15,000 in round numbers - will be beyond many people. More important, to my mind, is the amount of stuff that has to be done to get there in good order, bearing in mind that assisting a suicide is a criminal offence. So many doctors are chary of giving out the necessary letters. And dentists - although they are perhaps less likely to twig what you want your dental records for - might be equally chary of giving out your records - this being part of the pack that the people at Dignitas want. Apparently the police in this country get to visit the relatives of about half the people who chose to go and die in Switzerland - although I don't know how they get to know. Or, indeed, if one has to register such a death in this country.

So a booklet which is both helpful in a practical way, should one ever need to know about these things, and in a propaganda way. It would all be so much simpler and kinder if it could be done in one's own country, if not at home.

Third, it suddenly came to me that while this was a rather big issue for those involved, it was also a rather small issue in terms of numbers. Roughly one person a week goes to Dignitas from this country and roughly one hundred people a year chose an assisted death in Oregon, where assisted dying has been available for some time. Say 0.5% of deaths, which might translate to about 2,500 a year out of the 500,000 deaths a year in the UK. So a much smaller number of people than would be significantly affected by a liberalisation of our equally unsatisfactory laws in the matter of cannabis. So given the numbers, how does one raise enough steam to get the legislative time one needs? Is it a fair use of scarce legislative resources?

From where I associate to the large amount of misery caused by our feeble provision for mental health problems. Would this be a better use of campaigning energy?

Reference 1: https://www.thewilliamivpub.com/.

Reference 2: https://www.dignityindying.org.uk/.

Reference 3: https://www.mydeath-mydecision.org.uk/.

Reference 4: The true cost: How the UK outsources death to Dignitas - Dignity in Dying - 2017.