Physician Assisted Suicide in Washington – Will it Pass and Who Will it Include?

Former Washington governor Booth Gardner, now afflicted with Parkinson’s, is launching his last campaign driven by the desire to end his life.

Daniel Bergner, whose father is also inflicted with Parkinson’s, has more details in Death in the Family, NYTimes.com, Dec. 2, 2007:

The campaign he was starting *** goes by the name of “death with dignity,” and the statewide law he hopes to enact by popular vote on Election Day of 2008 would allow for “physician-assisted suicide[.]” ***

It would be modeled closely on a statute in Oregon, the only state where the movement has been successful. ***

Yet the proposed law in Washington wouldn’t go far enough for Gardner. It wouldn’t include him. Parkinson’s isn’t terminal. ***

The ’91 contest over a referendum similar to Gardner’s was, at the time, the most expensive ballot campaign in the state’s history. Polls showed the law about to pass, but in the final weeks a barrage of television advertisements helped to defeat it. ***

[A] hospice nurse warned: “Those who can’t afford health care and insurance could be pressured to have their lives ended. It could become the ultimate in discrimination.”