The Progressive Case Against Assisted Suicide

http://goo.gl/6KIosj

We all must take a skeptical look and acknowledge the role that money and power play in end-of- life decisions, and how assisted suicide is being used by some health care companies and decision-makers to increase their bottom line by denying treatment.

Physician assisted suicide disproportionately affects the poor and people living with disabilities. That explains, at least in part, why there is widespread opposition from virtually every disability rights group in the nation, including the National Council on Disability, the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), the National Council on Independent Living (NCIL), the National Spinal Cord Injury Association, the World Institute on Disability and FREED.

Assisted suicide doesn't exist in a vacuum as proponents would lead you to believe with their simplistic slogan. Rather, the current profit-driven health care system urges doctors to reduce care in order to cut costs. A lethal prescription costs no more than $300. Compare that to the cost of treatment for most long-term medical conditions and serious illnesses that can run into hundreds of thousands giving insurance companies or others making treatment cost decisions a direct financial incentive to suggest assisted suicide in lieu of expense.