UK legislation. Courts. End of life. Who decides?

originally posted by: CornishCeltGuy
As an aside, I checked out the welfare benefits available for me being incapacitated, turns out roughly £73 per week.
I make more than that in a day so didn't bother and instead am doing a couple of days work here and there as I'm able to.
How anyone can live on a tenner a day I can only imagine, must be hell.

There are online calculators and you could claim £200/week (Employment and Support Allowance = £73.10/week), (Council Tax Support = £16.35/week), (Housing Benefit = £116/week).

Rents alone on the South Coast are £700/month. Just living off chicken, bread, orange juice is around £50 week. Throw in council tax +£1500), sewage licenses (£700+), water rates (£1000), electricity (£1200).
On the Isle of Wight, rents are around £200/month cheaper for a way modern flat.

Room rates are:
Shared room LHA rate: £69.04
1 bedroom LHA rate: £116.53
2 bedroom LHA rate: £144.36
3 bedroom LHA rate: £172.60
4 bedroom LHA rate: £240.00


One of the things that really got to me was seeing the staff at the bakery of the supermarket chucking all the freshly made items straight into black plastic bin bags. Then there are office blocks that have been empty for years yet I had to wait four months for an apartment to come up in a downtown area.

originally posted by: stormcell
It was called the Liverpool Care Pathway:
en.wikipedia.org...

When someone is in their final years, they are suspectible to infections as the immune system slowly starts to fail. That can be compensated through antibiotics. Then their heart loses pressure leading to pneumonia and fluid buildup. That can be taken care of with a ventilator, pacemaker, and other medications. If there is any pain or discomfort, painkillers can be given But some medications will make people sleepy. The person becomes and bedridden. That leads to bedsores. And their whole situation will get worse, until they spend all day in bed asleep being kept alive by machines.

I get it yes of course, but removing fluids/nutrients will kill the patient 100% of the time. It is euthanasia the same as a morhine shot, just slower.
That poor mite Alphie, I don't know the answers, but if he is breathing independently albeit with occasional mouth to mouth from his parents, then I say withdrawing fluids and nutrients is effectively inhumane euthanasier.
The court sanctioning withdrawal of fluids/nutrients is the same court which would prosecute a medic for giving him a swift death through morphine.
I cannot reconcile that in my mind.

a reply to: stormcell

Housing needs are sorted thanks, it's just the staying alive paying regular bills (gas, electric, water) if I go further downhill and can't pull off enough work due to the as yet unknown 'condition'.
It is what it is, and a side issue to be fair, I'm more concerned about if I'm in a position where I'm close to losing independence then I have to top myself on the sly with assistance, and cunningly so the state can't find any evidence to prosecute anyone who assisted me.

...but it's okay for a court to order removal of fluids/nutrients to starve me to death if I reach the point where I am unable to communicate my wish for an injection of morphine. SMH.

originally posted by: stormcell
It was called the Liverpool Care Pathway:
en.wikipedia.org...

I thought this observation deserved a seperate reply, the different cities in the UK which give their name to either research or scales. Here's what Bristol has to offer, I don't really count Bristol as South West of England, but their accent is more south west than darkest Bodmin moor, whatever, anyway...

originally posted by: OtherSideOfTheCoin

originally posted by: Grambler

originally posted by: OtherSideOfTheCoin
a reply to: CornishCeltGuy

I support euthanasia but you are just flat out wrong to say that its happening in the UK with the removal of food and fluids.

When it gets to a point where you have terminal multiple organ failure then it does not matter if you if you have food or not you will die. If you can take food then you will be provided with food.

You are making it sound like we just stop feeding people witch is just simply not the reality.

They will not give be Alfie a feeding tube, and are using the police to ensure that the family does not get the child to qualified doctors that do want to give him a feeding tube

So yes, they are starving him

This thread is not about Alfie.

I work in the NHS, I am involved in palliative care, quite often sadly patients reach a point at which they are dying and can no longer eat or drink, their bodies are just shutting down. It gets to a point where providing any kind of nutritional support is just futile.

I am not killing my patients by not stuffing a horrible tube down their nose so I can pump them full of some stinking liquidised food that is going to leave them with pretty horrendous fecal incontinence or its just going to sit in their guts because they can no longer absorb it.

The level of ignorance on this issue is astounding.

You claim alfie had his organs shutting down prior to suspension of fluids/nutrients? Or was it just his 'terminal' undiagnosed brain degenerative condition? Of course if you suspend fluids/nutrients organs will start to fail, you don't die of rainbows.

originally posted by: OtherSideOfTheCoin

originally posted by: CornishCeltGuy
a reply to: eletheia

Either way a precedent has been set this week. A court could decide the only way I am allowed to die is by removal of fluids/nutrition and I say it sucks that the law doesn't allow a dignified morphine overdose when the outcome is the same.

I agree with you that it kind of sucks that you cannot be actively euthanised, if that is what you wish.

However I think your understanding of how palliative care actually works is lacking.

Have you any experience in caring for dying patients?

Oh removal of fluids/nutrients and prohibition of others providing, is quite active don't kid yourself, and it would be euthanasia if the person asked for it. What it isn't is humane, especially when you don't know what the right pain killer dose is with a patient that cant communicate.

originally posted by: eletheia

originally posted by: CornishCeltGuy
a reply to: eletheia

Either way a precedent has been set this week. A court could decide the only way I am allowed to die is by removal of fluids/nutrition and I say it sucks that the law doesn't allow a dignified morphine overdose when the outcome is the same.

My mother was in hospital at 93 years old, in very ill health, capable of

eating, and food was brought to her for every meal. She refused all food

she was asked what she would like but she didnt want food.

It was her choice and they didn't try to force her, and kept her medically

hydrated. She was looked after very well for two weeks when her heart

just gave out. All that time she was kept pain free, and as comfortable

as possible.

That's assisted suicide.

originally posted by: OtherSideOfTheCoin
a reply to: CornishCeltGuy

The lad in Liverpool then, do you support denying him nutrients/fluids when he is breathing independently?

Can he even swallow?

I mean from what I have read he has very limited reflex to pain so I don't think he can even swallow.

Then we have to ask is his digestive system actually functional?

Are you saying intravenous fluids with nutrients were provided?

originally posted by: OtherSideOfTheCoin
a reply to: CornishCeltGuy

Yes, euthanasia because the state has decided tube fed is no longer an option.

Because it won't do anything.

If someone has terminal cancer and is at the end of their life, unable to eat they will die because of the cancer not because some doctor refused to have a nurse insert a NG tube.

A septic patient does not die because they become too ill to be able to eat for themselves and then don't get a tube, they die because of the Sepsis.

They are not "starving to death" its just the underlying pathology that are killing them.

Lots of palliative patents are PEG/NG or TPN fed you make it sound so black and white, like one day the doctor says there is noting more we can do for you and all of a sudden they keep you locked in a room with no food.

Diagnoses of terminal condition can be in error, yet here we would have denial of fluids nutrients to cause failure of bodily functions.

Even removal of life support machines is highly questionable. And I ask when I hear removal of fluids, I assume even intravenously are being denied.

originally posted by: Blue Shift
In the United States, the end of life is determined by when the money runs out.

Yeah, and both sides as well as the president have been open to change. The public too is very angry about it. Only thing keeping the system as is is money from private interests going into politicians coffers.

originally posted by: ScepticScot

originally posted by: Onlyyouknow
I believe there are two different issues here; one being end of life care for an adult and the other- life saving treatment at all costs for a child.
Alfie should be given every chance available for treatment even outside of the U.K.; this should not be up to a judge at all.
An adult that is suffering an incurable illness and wishes to end life should be able to if they so choose.

I was a hospice and geriatric nurse in the US. No one was starved if able to eat and drink. There may or may not have been times when the amount of morphine given caused death because of the pain level the patient was experiencing even unconscious (eating and drinking had ceased at this point) while moaning in pain. It is an unspoken understanding in hospice care to keep the patient comfortable no matter what. It is horrifying for the patient and the family to watch their loved one in pain. Think of hospice as midwives for the afterlife.

UK law is frightening to me to hear you have so little control....

There is no alternative treatment available in Italy. The Italian doctors who examined him confirmed that.

It's just a decision about if it is better for him to be let die now or keep him alive artificially. That is very much an ethical decision, not a medical one.

Oh yes there is, there is a difference between offering life support machines as well as fluids nutrients vs removing all manner of care so as to cause cesation of bodily function. The UK COULD that is COULD OFFER the same treatment BUT THEY ARE NOW DENYING IT and DENYING IT BE provided elsewhere. Keeping 'artificially' alive, hah, you know how many people need machines to live? 'artificial' doesn't make it wrong in anyway.

All this by judges appointed by the queen, if I'm not mistaken, which are supposed to be some holy miraculously independent entity. I'm sorry but if it's true that I name you and pay you, you're part of my system(If I was president or king).