Ninety Percent Changed Their Minds

Physician-assisted suicide’s been legal in Oregon for five years. So the Center for Ethics in Health Care at Oregon Health and Science University did some research to see how things were going for the patients involved. The results were published in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association. What they found is shocking and should change the way many people feel about euthanasia. The research shows 90 percent of patients who asked their doctors for help in killing themselves changed their minds and chose to live. It turns out their biggest fear when first requesting the lethal prescription was pain. Later, they found out their pain could be managed and decided not to end it all. This clearly shows we need to provide basic comfort care to terminal patients, not death.