Debate Over Right to Die for Terminally Ill

As U.S. Supreme Court justices grapple with the issue of a terminally ill person’s right to die (Jan. 9), it strikes me that their deliberations might be easier if they had been present during my father-in-law’s death over the holidays. I say “during” his death because while the precise moment of his passing has been officially documented, the final process actually consumed the final three or four days of his life. When the prescribed painkillers could no longer overcome the agony of the disease that ravaged his body, he was even deprived of restful sleep.

Buck Harper was a strong, brave and gentle man who seldom complained of his considerable ailments, but he was left to writhe in his bed and emit heart-wrenching moans of “Ohhhhhh!” that could be heard all over the house and by concerned friends calling on the phone. It seemed he was a victim of the cruelest form of torture.

Later, he gained some respite from that agony in a semiconscious state in which he seemed to be violently fighting a battle within himself whether to live or die. Most of the time he thrashed about the bed so fiercely that my mother-in-law or my wife had to lie or sit with him, cradling him to keep him from hurting himself.

In retrospect, it would have been preferable to spare Buck that suffering. My wife and I have had ongoing debates on the subjects of the right to die and capital punishment. She, a lifelong committed Christian, believes in neither. But once in those final moments as she cradled her writhing, moaning father and I watched haplessly from across the room, she confessed to me, “I think I’m having second thoughts about Dr. Kevorkian.” And when the supposedly wisest legal minds in the land can’t settle the issue, the answer is obvious: You need to be there to understand.

RICHARD ROBERTS

Wilmington

* Re the Supreme Court case, I am a very concerned citizen and one with firsthand knowledge, having spent nearly 11 years caring for my comatose husband. Although euthanasia had been recommended, I brought him home where he awoke with cognition and enjoyed life around him. I know of many individuals who, like my husband, had been pronounced “brain dead” but recovered to live out normal lives.

Knowing that a decision favoring suicide would only be the first step on a steep, slippery slope, I would ask our Supreme Court to carefully consider the far-reaching ramifications. It would usher in a duty to die, set up flirtation with suicide for the discouraged, give implied authority to make judgments on others’ quality of life, encourage the poaching of a person’s organs and launch broad-scale euthanasia on anyone deemed unfit.

Life is irreplaceable. No matter how hard we try, we cannot keep anyone alive forever. Shouldn’t everyone have the full opportunity to live as long as possible?

CHERYL HUTCHERSON RN

Institute of Bioethics

Long Beach