If you are considered a burden by others, you sense it. Like Dr Ashton\u2019s youngish men disheartened not to be the breadwinners, sick old people may well be overwhelmed by a sense of rejection, made worse by physical pain. The supporters of Lord Falconer\u2019s Bill make much of the fact that those handed out the \u201conly six months to live\u201d\u009d sentence proposed by the Bill will take the fatal drugs it provides themselves, and by their own choice. But what in the culture will guide that choice? What is the effect on the patient\u2019s free will when a profession whose entire previous raison d\u2019\u00c3\u00aatre has been to assist life now stands ready to give you the tools of death?<\/p>\n
Once it becomes legal that such a thing could happen, how long before it becomes expected? Most old people in hospital try to conform to what they think the system wants. If it wants them dead, and gives them the power to die, their grim path of duty lies clear. Some will have families who do not care enough whether they live; others will have no families at all. To all of these, Lord Falconer\u2019s \u201cchoice\u201d\u009d could become as proverbial as Hobson\u2019s.<\/p>\n
It does not have to be this way. Think of the revolution in attitudes to the disabled and mentally handicapped that has taken place in the past 40 years.<\/p>\n