• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • Videos
  • Signup for Emails
  • What You Can Do
  • About True Dignity
    • About the Board
    • Contact Us
  • Links
  • Report Abuse

True Dignity

Citizens Against Assisted Suicide

Ad example

Suicide is never death with dignity, and assisted suicide legislation threatens true patient choices at the end of life.

A Vermont Doctor’s Letter to the American Medical Association

August 10, 2017 by Administrators

For more than a year, rumors have circulated that the American Medical Association is about to change its long-held position of opposition to the legalization of assisted suicide.  Whether or not that is true, only time will tell.

A Vermont physician wrote the following eloquent letter to the AMA, expressing her vehement opposition to any softening of its opposition.  It is a perfect explanation of why, as the current position of the AMA states, “…these practices (assisted suicide and euthanasia) are fundamentally inconsistent with the physician’s role as healer.”

Here, in italics, is the letter.  Thank you, Carol Salazar M.D.  Anyone may also write the AMA at elliott.crigger@ama-assn.org.

Dear Elliot Crigger

I understand that you are the person to send comments to regarding the AMA’s upcoming consideration of withdrawing the organization’s opposition to Physician Assisted Suicide.

I am a practicing Primary Care Internist in Vermont, where sadly PAS has been legalized.  I walk with people through the end of life every day. I also have a teenage daughter.

In a world where we have seen violence, hopelessness, suicide ( especially in teens ) and addiction skyrocket, we , as physicians , will be sending the wrong message to our patients and our children who will inherit the world we leave them. What message are we sending them?

We will be telling them that autonomy trumps all… that because I want to control how I leave this world, I have the right to do whatever I want
… that there is no absolute truth…
that human life  does not matter.
That suffering should be wiped out .

Unfortunately suffering is a part of the human condition as can be seen in the literature of even ancient times . We as physicians are tasked to alleviate suffering.  We cannot always cure , but we can always comfort . We should be pouring our efforts into end of life care both at home and in Hospice institutions .

The slippery slope is real and I fear we have started our descent . We have been there before, even in our own country.  If it is ok to ask a physician to help me kill myself , it is a very short slide to extending it to the disabled and even the depressed.  The papers are FULL of stories of teen suicides and drug overdoses. It is our task to show them that we are willing to walk with them in their suffering and not give up on them.

I believe every physician should read “”The Nazi Doctors” by Dr. Ray Lifton. Proponents of PAS do not like it when I bring this comparison up. It is very painful and difficult to read because it shows how killing was medicalized and therefore came to be accepted by so many everyday physicians.

The AMA is proposing to support the medicalization of suicide… it is to be one of the “treatments” we are to offer as end of life care.

  It is a huge mistake to withdraw the opposition to PAS.  I hope that we as physicians have learned from the past and will stand firm for what is right.

Sincerely
Carol Salazar MD

 

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Primary Sidebar

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Stay Active!

  • Get Action Alerts Emails
  • Make Calls
  • Write Letters

Vermont Government

  • Governor Phil Scott
  • Lt. Governor David Zuckerman
  • State Reps By District
  • State Senators By District
  • VT Legislative Directory

Stay Informed!

  • Join our email list

More to See

(no title)

January 16, 2011 By Administrators

PHYSICAL MOVEMENTS OR OTHER EXTERNAL SIGNS OF DISTRESS ARE SOMETIMES EXHIBITED”

February 28, 2022 By Administrators

ACTION ALERT

January 11, 2022 By carolyn

Tags

abuse Act 39 Another Defeat for Assisted Suicide coercion Letters to the Editor: Pauline Austin Opponents of Assisted Suicide Greatly Outnumber Proponents at Manchester Forum. S.74 safeguards Story of a person with disabilities opposing assisted suicide telehealth

Article Categories

  • Ablism (2)
  • Acceptance of Unintended Consequences (5)
  • Action Alert (3)
  • Administrative (4)
  • Agism (4)
  • Alerts (24)
  • Animal euthanasia argument (4)
  • Board (1)
  • Brittany Maynard (1)
  • California (4)
  • Canada (3)
  • Canada Supreme Court (1)
  • Cheapness of Assisted Suicide (5)
  • Choice Becomes "Duty" to Die (14)
  • Chronic Diseases Rendered Terminal by Non-treatment (3)
  • Classism and Assisted Suicide (4)
  • Colorado (2)
  • Commentary (27)
  • Compassion and Choices (7)
  • Conflict of Interest (4)
  • Connecticut (6)
  • Conscience Rights (2)
  • Cost Cutting Agenda of Barbara Coombs Lee (2)
  • Countering the PAS lobby (1)
  • Court rulings (1)
  • CT (1)
  • Damage to Family (3)
  • Damage to Helpers (1)
  • Death with Dignity (3)
  • Defeats in other states (10)
  • Depression (8)
  • Devaluation of Lives with Disabilities (32)
  • Disability Rights Groups' Opposition (30)
  • Doctor's Power (3)
  • Dying with Real Dignity (1)
  • Editorials (5)
  • Elder Abuse (25)
  • Election 2014 (3)
  • Error Possibility (2)
  • Euthanasia/Assisted Suicide Contagion (2)
  • Euthanasia/Assisted Suicide Two Sides of the Same Coin (8)
  • Exemption options (4)
  • Expansion of Assisted Suicide/Euthanasia (16)
  • Georgia (3)
  • Germany (1)
  • Healthy people helped to commit suicide (2)
  • Language manipulation (3)
  • Legal Opinions (7)
  • Legislative Efforts in Other Countries (3)
  • Legislative Efforts in Other States (10)
  • Legislative Testimony (1)
  • Letters to the Editors of Newspapers (13)
  • Letters to the Legislature (2)
  • Maine (1)
  • Maryland (1)
  • Massachusetts (3)
  • Medical Opinions (18)
  • Medical Power (5)
  • Medical Societies (6)
  • Montana (2)
  • Moratorium (2)
  • Murder Invitation (3)
  • Nevada (1)
  • Never Investigated (1)
  • New Jersey (5)
  • New Mexico (1)
  • New York (4)
  • New York (1)
  • Not a Peaceful Death (5)
  • Oregon (4)
  • Other Countries (3)
  • Other States (11)
  • Out of State/General (10)
  • Palliative Care (7)
  • Personal Stories (6)
  • Pharmacists (6)
  • Polls (4)
  • Pro Assisted Suicide (1)
  • Prognosis Inaccuracy (3)
  • Racism and Assisted Suicide (1)
  • Randy Brock (1)
  • Rationing (3)
  • Reasons to Oppose (3)
  • Rejections of Assisted Suicide in Other Countries (3)
  • Rejections of Assisted Suicide in other states (5)
  • Relatives Won't Know (4)
  • Religious "movement" (1)
  • Repeal Effort (4)
  • Richard Doerflinger (1)
  • Selfishness of Proponents (3)
  • Selling of Suicide (7)
  • Silencing Opposition (2)
  • Slippery Slope (23)
  • Suicide Contagion (23)
  • Suicide Increase (10)
  • Suicide Tourism (3)
  • Talking Points (2)
  • Testimony before non-VT legislative bodies (3)
  • Transparency Lack (1)
  • True Dignity (22)
  • Uncategorized (375)
  • Unused Drug Dangers (1)
  • Unworkability if Regulations Attempt to Make AS "Safe" (1)
  • Updates (1)
  • US (1)
  • Vermont (18)
  • Vermont Alliance for Ethical Health Care (5)
  • Vermont Governor (4)
  • Vermont Legislature (61)
  • Videos (24)
  • Vote Count on Passage (4)
  • Vote Results (5)

Footer

Tags

abuse Act 39 Another Defeat for Assisted Suicide coercion Letters to the Editor: Pauline Austin Opponents of Assisted Suicide Greatly Outnumber Proponents at Manchester Forum. S.74 safeguards Story of a person with disabilities opposing assisted suicide telehealth

Recent

  • (no title)
  • PHYSICAL MOVEMENTS OR OTHER EXTERNAL SIGNS OF DISTRESS ARE SOMETIMES EXHIBITED”
  • ACTION ALERT
  • S.74: A step down the slippery slope
  • Vermont’s Second Assisted Suicide Report Does Not Reassure

Search

Copyright © 2025 · True Dignity · Log in