Comments on The Pensive Quill: Geneva Fallout

Helen I did support Dr Jack! It seemed to me tha...

2011-07-10T08:22:02.570+01:00

Helen

I did support Dr Jack! It seemed to me that it is an option people have the right to take if they are to self-. I just think it ceases to be self-determining when pressure is applied to make the decision.

Fionnchú, I was unaware that it took an autopsy t...

2011-07-08T23:00:51.026+01:00

Fionnchú,

I was unaware that it took an autopsy to ascertain Alzheimer’s. Your experience was harrowing.

‘The "healthcare" industry's profits, the insurance boggles, tax burdens, the expenses of "palliative" treatments, the rise of hospices, lucrative drugs, government cutbacks, the collapse of pensions, and the costs of a very profitable sector conspire to make a complicated situation as we age, don't they?’

An apt summary of the problems ahead.

AM "Many who ostensibly worry about the elder...

2011-07-07T21:43:28.021+01:00

AM
"Many who ostensibly worry about the elderly being carted off to euthanasia clinics are often found wanting when it comes to arguing for greater funding for the health service".

How right you are Anthony. If anything, our government is constantly cutting health care funding to the aged and infirmed with little resistance from anyone not directly affected by the cuts. I am not a fan of “assisted dying” (Jack Kevorkian style) however, I do agree with former bishop Michael Nazir-Ali, that “what we do have the right to expect is a good, caring, pain-free, peaceful death;”

Fionnuala:
The "healthcare" industry's profits, the insurance boggles, tax burdens, the expenses of "palliative" treatments, the rise of hospices, lucrative drugs, government cutbacks, the collapse of pensions, and the costs of a very profitable sector conspire to make a complicated situation as we age, don't they?

IMO I think it all goes hand-in-hand with the “Globalists” plan to reduce the population throughout the world with more famines, disease and war. Some of our childhood diseases are even reappearing 20 years later after supposedly being eradicated…i.e., whooping cough and TB just to mention some. According to Jim Marrs, former newspaper journalist and New York Times best-selling author, says “the mysterious deaths of microbiologists, as well as the suppression of work by people like Royal Rife demonstrate how their plan is proceeding through eliminating possible cures for diseases.” And don't forget the infamous Kissinger Report. Far-fetched? I don’t think so when you take a good look at all the suffering going on around the world today. IMO modern technology has not been advanced to the betterment of mankind but rather to the destruction of mankind.

With my mother-in-law dying (presumably from Alzhe...

2011-07-04T20:00:36.854+01:00

With my mother-in-law dying (presumably from Alzheimer's but did you know that this cannot be definitively confirmed in anyone without an autopsy?) at nearly 90, the precipitous decline in four or five years drained us of funds, wore us out with worry, and weighed us down mightily as she had nobody left in my wife's family but my wife to care for her. As Marty comments, the toll it takes on all of us financially, emotionally, and practically is exhausting and enormous. To see one you know regressing back into childlike dependence is both eerie and heartbreaking.

There's a recent HBO documentary, harrowing, "To Die in Oregon," about those who choose assisted suicide after it was made legal. My wife vows not to put herself or our family through what her mother went through when and if the time comes and her own condition deteriorates.

With demographics tipping so that there'll be a six-fold increase soon in the elderly, and as we edge into that category, I predict many of us will have to face for us, our spouses, and our close relatives, choices that will be like those of a few Oregonians.

The "healthcare" industry's profits, the insurance boggles, tax burdens, the expenses of "palliative" treatments, the rise of hospices, lucrative drugs, government cutbacks, the collapse of pensions, and the costs of a very profitable sector conspire to make a complicated situation as we age, don't they?

Mackers, In some elections there were more dead th...

2011-07-03T22:53:21.690+01:00

Mackers,
In some elections there were more dead than living voting.
What a power, he could actually bring people back from the dead.

I suppose folks its an old Irish tradition;vote ea...

2011-07-03T06:40:57.282+01:00

I suppose folks its an old Irish tradition;vote early ,vote often!

Michaelhenry, he is a firm believer in voting rig...

2011-07-02T21:25:35.867+01:00

Michaelhenry,

he is a firm believer in voting rights for dead people. And he is not sectarian. He will take the vote of a dead Protestant as quickly as a dead Catholic.

Fionnuala- 'people have voted for him from th...

2011-07-02T13:02:16.580+01:00

Fionnuala-

'people have voted for him from the other side'

Are you on about the dead- or the prods [ non catholic ] or both-

Mackers, people have voted for him from the other ...

2011-07-01T23:41:37.196+01:00

Mackers,
people have voted for him from the other side so I suppose anything is possible.

Nuala, the Master has sent quite a few to find ou...

2011-07-01T18:05:34.868+01:00

Nuala,

the Master has sent quite a few to find out already

Mackers, It would be ground breaking stuff, it mig...

2011-07-01T18:01:26.535+01:00

Mackers,
It would be ground breaking stuff, it might make the Master a bit edgy though.
No doubt he would have a few unwilling volunteers cross over and select the candidates.

Nuala, this sort of reminds me of the Monty Pyth...

2011-07-01T17:48:12.188+01:00

Nuala,

this sort of reminds me of the Monty Python sketch where they were discussing life after death and had three dead people in the studio to debate it. I am sure there are programmes that discuss life after death but none that I have watched.

Mackers, I would have found something like this in...

2011-07-01T17:37:17.608+01:00

Mackers,
I would have found something like this incredibly hard to watch.
Death is a very difficult subject, someone wrote in another post it was something which had preoccupied them as a child.
I was always more preoccupied with what happens after death, any documentaries on that subject yet?

Nuala, he spoiled his own piece with some lightw...

2011-06-30T22:44:06.678+01:00

Nuala,

he spoiled his own piece with some lightweight contentions. If you want to do sarcasm you have to do it well otherwise it doesn't work. It took away from his piece. But he had a point and it needs to be factored in. There is always a social consequence and it can't be ruled out of discussion.

Marty,

agreed.

When you watch someone who once was a proud and ab...

2011-06-30T22:07:38.853+01:00

When you watch someone who once was a proud and able human being,who due to the ravages of alzheimer,s become a total stranger not only to their family,but dont even know how they are themselves,are so terrified they try climbing out of first floor windows, when eventually the family can suffer no more that person has to be taken into care and in effect drugged so much that they are nothing more than the living dead,and people say that their is dignity in such life! living for living sake is not a life its imo an existence without meaning,and certainly not what I would want ,Terry Pratchett had the courage to bring this debate into the public domain,he should be thanked not pilloried,anyone facing such a dreadfull death should have the right to choose and the better informed they are the better,

Mackers, I would go with Kevin McKenna on this on...

2011-06-30T21:19:35.989+01:00

Mackers,
I would go with Kevin McKenna on this one. I think money is as big a dictate in our exit as our entrance.