I wrote some time ago about the awful and tragic case of Kerrie Woolterton. Woolterton was badly mentally disturbed, so much so, that she now only wanted to commit suicide but repeatedly tried to by swallowing anti freeze. The last time she tried, she called an ambulance and then pinned a note on her chest that she didn’t want treatment. Astonishingly, the physicians were so paralyzed by terminal non judgmentalism, they just stood by for a day and watched her die.
Now a coroner’s inquest has said they were right to do so. This means that saving the lives of suicide victims will not be attempted if they just put a note on their clothes saying they want no care. What a profound abandonment!
Some in the UK have noticed and are reacting with proper horror and disgust. From a commentary in the Telegraph “Kerrie Wooltorton’s Death Shows How We Have Lost Respect For Life:”
This is where we have arrived in our attitude to suicide in Britain today. A disturbed young woman, with all the promise of adult life before her, is left to kill herself, because under her current circumstances she wants to…
There is a public attitude that is now pro-suicide, fostered by the euthanasia lobbyists Dignity in Dying, Lord Falconer’s frustrated assisted-suicide amendments in the House of Lords the commercialisation of self-destruction by Swiss clinic Dignitas. Want to kill yourself? Of course you do. You have that right. Go ahead.
These people have successfully usurped what generations of humankind have known as the sanctity of life. That doesn’t have to be a religious belief. It is simply the intuition that we hold and value human life over the taking of it. And the pro-death lobbyists and Lords, evidently, have now infected the intuitive responses of our medical emergency services.
Right on. A lot of people have much for which to answer morally in this plunge off a vertical moral cliff, which is happening here too, just in slower motion.
And remember, this is the country that has now decriminalized the assisted suicides of the terminally ill and people with disabilities who are helped into death by family or friends. I will have a piece coming out on that travesty shortly.
October 2nd, 2009 | 2:12 pm
This particularly case is all the more appalling since the victim actually *called an ambulance*. Which is a fairly powerful signal that, regardless of the note, what she wanted was help.
It appears Britain is increasingly choosing to ignore everything we have learned about suicide and depression over the past fifty years — willfully rejecting good medical practice just when we have in hand ever better tools and resources to cope with pain, disability and depression with more and more effectiveness.
October 2nd, 2009 | 5:03 pm
Wesley! I honestly feel sympathy for Britain and I ask myself if you did not use a little tongue-in-cheek when you wrote this post.
Without trying to get too far off topic, I can almost hear some of my ancestor’s spirits who worked on sailboats all their life running from France to Canada saying something like, Victor don’t start feeling sorry for these people. :)
Anyway Wesley, you’re doing what you honestly feel is right in your heart, soul and mind so keep UP the good words and I’m sure that God’s Angels will eventually set U>S on the right track if need be!
Peace
October 2nd, 2009 | 8:27 pm
Wesley, do you have a link to the coroner’s statement or to a story that quotes it. I don’t think the Telegraph story does. I have a morbid interest in seeing how the coroner spun the matter.
October 3rd, 2009 | 11:16 am
Kerrie is mistaken when saying, “That doesn’t have to be a religious belief. It is simply the intuition that we hold and value human life over the taking of it.”
For the vast majority of history in the vast majority of countries, suicide was considered okay — even honourable. It’s definitely okay with the Stoics, Epicureans, and Roman Pagans. It’s okay in Eastern Countries and European Nobility where being dishonored (or if your husband dies in pre-modern India) is a good reason for suicide. And if you have re-incarnation, well you might be born into a better life, so suicide is compassionate. It’s not surprising that euthanasia and infanticide were also sanctioned.
It’s only in the nations where Christians (and I imagine Jews and Muslims) dominate where the sanctity of life and hope of redemption work together to make suicide a tragedy that needs compassion, and not praise.
The problem isn’t one of rationality. It’s a problem of the heart and a problem of world view. If your world view is too this worldly or too other worldly, life has no meaning, so whatever happens is okay. In the grand scheme of infinite time, it makes no difference. But if your world view holds that both are valuable, life has value and even if the worst were to happen, there is still hope that the infinite future will wash away the shame and suffering of the past.
October 3rd, 2009 | 11:31 am
Why are you so concerned about what the U.K. does. Are you implying that the same will happen in the USA if we try to reform health care? If you’re REALLY so concerned about what the Brits are doing you ought to tell THEM about it instead of burying your American audience under mounds of sanctimonious BS.
October 3rd, 2009 | 11:36 am
[...] Finally, add in a UK coroner’s inquest in the Kerrie Woolterton case concluding that doctors were right to stand by and let her die from swallowing anti freeze because she wrote a note refusing treatment, and you have a perfect storm of abandonment. [...]
October 3rd, 2009 | 12:18 pm
There’s a quote from the coroner in this discussion at the British Medical Journal, where it looks like many doctors are uneasy with what happened in this case. Worth a look….
http://blogs.bmj.com/ebmh-talk/2009/10/02/respecting-the-right-to-die%E2%80%A6revisited/
October 3rd, 2009 | 3:00 pm
@HistoryWriter,
First things is an international blog, so posting UK related stories is valid. IMO, there aren’t enough of this stories from “enlightened” countries because this is by no means an American problem. Like members of a gang, all advanced societies are encouraging each other to become more “enlightened in the ways of the world” so all countries can have no differences and thus be at peace with each other. Above all, this phenomenon should not be tied to the American health care debate, since it cheapens.
I do however understand your frustration. As a Canadian it does sadden me when Canada’s Medicare is misrepresented (and I’m sure that other nationals are similarly saddened). From my understanding, Obama never proposed a Canadian style system. If he did, all he’d do is make Medicare mandatory, provide a list of minimum services, provide the states with some money, and leave the actual administering of Medicare to the States. Different states would run Medicare however they wanted. This diversity is a key strength of the Canadian system. Although everyone is covered, the health care in Alberta (the Canadian equivalent of Texas) is quite different from the health care in Quebec (the Canadian equivalent to the US Northeast). Affirming both unity and diversity,…., E pluribus unum as Americans would say.
October 4th, 2009 | 7:52 pm
Ronald,
I’m glad SOMEBODY appreciates my frustration with this site’s numerous misrepresentations. Unfortunately Wesley ties everything that’s wrong with health care delivery anywhere in the world to the US health care debate. If the British NHS is having problems, then this site presents it so as to imply (or sometimes say outright) “if you undertake reform this will happen to you…” In effect, the site has become a bully-pulpit for conservative Republican politics as Wesley persists in mocking ANY attempted reform as “Obamacare” and “socialized medicine.” To make matters worse he’s been sharing his efforts by associating with some people intelligent people should be avoiding — like Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council. Note: rest assured, organizations with the name “Family” in them are usually one or another group of hyper-religious “values-voting” weirdos.
October 11th, 2009 | 2:23 pm
[...] the Vulnerable in the UK to Assisted Suicide Abuse; It’s Official: Terminally Nonjudgmental UK Doesn’t Give a Fig About Saving the Lives of Suicidal People …. [...]
October 17th, 2009 | 10:13 am
Yeesh! If I ever need medical attention, I hope I’m not in Britain!
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