My biggest problem with th euthanasia issue is: What protections are in place to truely see to it that it is the patient's decision and not that of the doctor, family, HMO, or State...Money has a way of finding its way into the decisions surrounding care for the elderly andthe terminally ill and that is really scary from a morality standpoint.

Even if the patient says: "I want to die." How can we determine that this is a decision that was not made under financial or emotional duress as opposed to pain and suffering duress. And even in the case of pain and suffering, I've seen people recover from breif illnesses that were so bad that they would say at the time: "I wish I would just die." So we must consider not just the patients wishes, but also the truely terminal nature of their illness...And do they just have a low tolerance for pain?

Is old age itself a terminal illness that would qualifiy? I hope not!

I've seen what ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease) can do to someone, and I can see why a person inflicted with that or a similar disease might want to "end it with dignity". But I wonder if medical science couldn't come up with a better way of managing the cases so that the pain and suffering might be aleviated in some way short of purposefully killing the patient with poison.

Wish I had the answer on that one.

Scott