RIGHT TO KILL

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 865, 8 January 1930, Page 12

RIGHT TO KILL

EMINENT SURGEON SAYS “NO” "LIKE A HANGMAN” Do doctors in Great Britain ever administer an overdose of morphine to end the agony of an incurable patient? Would it be feasible to have a council of medical men to adjudicate as to when science should relieve doomed patients of their suffering? These questions on the new "Right to Kill” discussion which has followed the acquittal of Richard Corbett, the young Anglo-Frenchman who killed his mother to save her from a slow and painful death, were discussed by Sir John Bland-Sutton, the eminent surgeon, recently. Sir John, who has given much thought to the matter, and has frequently debated it at medical gatherings, is strongly opposed to the "right to kill theory. "I know there is an idea in the public mind that in some extreme cases doctors do put an end to the sufferings of doomed patients,” said Sir John. "But never in all my experience have I had evidence of such a thing happening in actual fact; nor do I know a doctor who would do such a thing. “At the same time, if a doctor did for humanitarian reasons kill a patient it is extremely unlikely that it would ever be brought to light, and It would be the most difficult thing in the world to prove. "Like Being Hangman” “The suggestion that the right to Kill should be vested in a body of medical men has been considered many times, but it never will be countenanced in this country. I would certainly never sit on such a committee. "It would be like being a hangman. It is too horrible to think of. “Perhaps the biggest argument against the right to kill idea is that no doctor, however skilled, can say when a person is doomed. •‘Nor can a person’s own desire to die be taken as authority for the right to kill. "Many times I have been asked by a patient to put an end to his sufferings with that pathetic request, ‘Just a little more morphine, doctor. I want to die.’ "But in many cases the patient has lived to thank me for not having taken him at his word. "Whatever may happen on the Continent, X am convinced that the right to kill idea will never be countenanced in this country.”