Euthanasia in the Netherlands
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In 2002, The Netherlands legalized euthanasia. The law codified a twenty year old convention of not persecuting doctors who have committed euthanasia in very specific cases, under very specific circumstances. The Ministry of Public Health, Wellbeing and Sports claims that this practice "allows a person to end their life in dignity after having received every available type of palliative care."[1]
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[edit] Practice
In 2003, in the Netherlands, 1626 cases were officially reported of euthanasia in the sense of a physician assisting the death (1.2% of all deaths). Usually the sedative sodium thiopental is intravenously administered to induce a coma. Once it is certain that the patient is in a deep coma, typically after some minutes, Pancuronium is administered to stop the breathing and cause death.
Officially reported were also 148 cases of physician assisted dying (0.14% of all deaths), usually by drinking a strong (10g) barbiturate potion. The doctor is required to be present for two reasons:
- to make sure the potion is not taken by a different person, by accident (or, theoretically, for "unauthorized" suicide or perhaps even murder)
- to monitor the process and be available to apply the combined procedure mentioned below, if necessary
In two cases the doctor was reprimanded for not being present while the patient drank the potion. They said they had not realized that this was required.
Forty-one cases were reported to combine the two procedures: usually in these cases the patient drinks the potion, but this does not cause death. After a few hours, or earlier in the case of vomiting, the muscle relaxant is administered to cause death.
By far, most reported cases concerned cancer patients. Also, in most cases the procedure was applied at home.
[edit] Social debate
The legislation has wide support among the socially libertarian Dutch, who have one of the world's highest life expectancies. There is, however, persistent opposition, mainly from the orthodox protestant Political Reformed Party and the ChristianUnion, which call for more attention for palliative care and the eventual illegalization of the procedure.
In 1992, Huib Drion, a member of the Dutch high court proposed to develop and legalize a drug, which is now known as Drion's pill. This fictional drug would be a set of 2 pills. The first pill could be taken without any harm; the second pill would have to be taken a couple of days later (and only then would work). This would give the patient the time to think things over. The main goal of this drug would be to allow people who have unbearable psychological suffering to end their life, especially old people who feel their life is finished. The drug was never developed. The proposal, however, indirectly started up the discussion of euthanasia in Netherlands.
