This could be huge, because it exposes the entire charade that is the Oregon “oversight” over the act of legalized physician-assisted suicide.
Here’s the story: Recently when Scotland was considering legalizing assisted suicide–which failed in the Scottish Parliament–two Oregonians very close to the practice in their state testified by video link. One was Deborah Whiting Jaques, executive director of the Oregon Hospice Association. The other was Dr. Linda Ganzini, a professor of psychiatry and medicine at the Oregon Health and Science University, who has conducted a number of studies on the law. From the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide Update story (Vol. 4 # 4, 2010), taken from the (9/7/10) transcript of the Scottish Parliament committee hearing:
When the committee asked the two women to describe Oregon’s official doctor-assisted suicide oversight and monitoring procedures, Jaques replied:
We do not have a monitoring committee approach. Physicians are responsible for reporting death with dignity to the Department of Human Services. The Compassion and Choices agency [Me: It is actually a private assisted suicide advocacy group] produces the reports, collects the data and provides them to the State of Oregon, which ensures that the data are published and made publicly available on an annual basis.
Are you kidding me? If this is true, it confirms everything opponents of assisted suicide have said about the unreliability of the Oregon statistics, the paucity of the actual oversight, and how the law should be retitled, The Compassion and Choices Empowerment Act.
I’ll have more on this. Soon.
Update: The State of Oregon denied it. I posted the quote here.
December 23rd, 2010 | 12:09 am
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Vince Humphreys. Vince Humphreys said: SHS: Compassion and Choices Compiles Oregon Assisted Suicide “Official” Statistics! http://bit.ly/hfFTmt #tcot [...]
December 23rd, 2010 | 2:02 am
Wow. I live here in Oregon; I follow this issue closely, and I didn’t know that.
It’s possible that no one outside the small circle of C&C staff and supporters, connecting to the small circle of DHHS employees dealing with this, knew about it either. There you have it: secrecy surrounding assisted suicide is alive and well, and they sold it to the public in 1994 insisting that it would bring the practice “out into the open”.
With most of the editorial staff at The Oregonian on board with assisted suicide, my guess is we shouldn’t hold our breath to see if the paper will pick up the story and the _blatant conflict of interest_ here. I’ll watch for anything and send a link if I see something.
December 23rd, 2010 | 3:11 am
That truly is disturbing. You mean Compassion and Choices is IN CHARGE of providing AS statistics to the state of oregon? The state doesn’t do that independently?
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 23rd, 2010 at 10:39 am
safepres. So it seems. Will do some follow up inquiries.
December 23rd, 2010 | 7:57 am
[...] First Things (blog) [...]
December 23rd, 2010 | 4:31 pm
“The Oregon Death with Dignity Act requires the Oregon Department of Human Services to collect information about the patients and physicians who participate in the Act, and publish an annual statistical report.” (via http://www.oregon.gov/DHS/ph/pas/index.shtml)
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 23rd, 2010 at 4:49 pm
That’s true. But that doesn’t mean the statement by the witness is false. [I edited out a part of my statement that suggested she works for C and C. I mistook Melissa for another commenter here. Sorry Melissa.]
December 24th, 2010 | 7:08 pm
This is another reminder that all around the country special interest legislation these days almost always sets up a special relationship between the government and the sponsoring entity that – surprise, surprise – tends to benefit the sponsor. Yes, I know this boggles the mind. And they seemed such reasonably nice people at the time.
December 24th, 2010 | 10:43 pm
What did your follow-up inquiries reveal, Wesley? Because it seems to me that Deborah Jaques simply mispoke when she referred to C and C compiling Oregon assisted suicide statistics.
The Death With Dignity Act requires attending physicians to file a report with Oregon’s Centre for Health Statistics within ten days of the patient’s death and requires pharmacists to send similar reports to the State Registrar within ten days of dispensing a lethal prescription. The information (identities of patients, physicians and other health care practitioners) is also meant to be strictly confidential – with only summary statistics being made available to the public in annual reports. It’s unlikely that the State’s Centre for Health Statistics (to whom these data are directly sent) would then hand confidential information on to C&C for analysis or collation. What purpose would that serve?
I watched the relevant section of the committee hearing (the footage is up on the BBC website) and it almost seemed to me that Jaques was referring to the Department of Human Services (or a section within it) as “the compassion and choices agency”. Regardless, her statement as it stands appears to be erroneous (unless your sleuthing revealed something more substantial).
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 25th, 2010 at 12:09 am
RC: I have a request for confirmation into the state, but they are out until after Christmas. If I hear anything further, I will either post it here or use it in a broader article. But that is a tough misspeak. No one brought up C and C but her in the transcript generally. Besides, C and C facilitates the vast bulk of Oregon assisted suicides, even producing their own statistics. I think they and the state are quite chummy.
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