On Sunday, the Senate Judiciary Committee will consider radical assisted suicide H.B. 47 sponsored by Rep. Deborah Armstrong (D-Bernalillo) at 3:00 p.m. Please sign up to testify below.
The bill seeks to further normalize a culture of death in New Mexico by letting medical professionals prescribe lethal drugs to patients who have been diagnosed with a terminal illness that could take their lives anytime up to six months.
H.B. 47, which devalues human life and dangerously violates ethical codes in medicine, is sponsored by anti-life extremist Rep. Deborah Armstrong (D-Bernalillo) and a few other partisan Democrats in the Legislature.
The American Medical Association (AMA) itself decries assisted suicide as an affront to the practice of medicine. According to the American Medical Association’s Code of Ethics Medical Opinion 5.7:
“Physician-assisted suicide is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer, would be difficult or impossible to control, and would pose serious societal risks.”
“Instead of engaging in assisted suicide, physicians must aggressively respond to the needs of patients at the end of life. Physicians:
Should not abandon a patient once it is determined that cure is impossible.
Must respect patient autonomy.
Must provide good communication and emotional support.
Must provide appropriate comfort care and adequate pain control.
In Oregon and California–states that allow assisted suicide–patients have been denied payment for treatments to save their lives, but have been told that less-costly lethal drugs would be covered. Assisted suicide creates a strong economic incentive to deny treatment, which is the antithesis of the above medical ethics mandate from the AMA to provide appropriate comfort care and adequate pain control.
According to official numbers from Oregon, suicide in the general population in the state is 40% above the national average during the 20 year period that Oregon has had legal assisted suicide.
In July, it was reported that New Mexico’s suicide rate was the highest in the nation. This bill would further encourage suicide as a socially acceptable alternative to life–a dangerous mindset to place in the minds of people young and old living in our state. By embracing more death and treating people who have a terminal illness as expendable, New Mexico would be dehumanizing individuals and treating them as a burden.
In Canada, where assisted suicide is legal for the ill and the elderly, they are now trying to force through assisted suicide for people who have disabilities, claiming it will save health care costs (as the country has a socialized medicine system). They are threatening patients, such as a man named Roger Foley, who has cerebellar ataxia, a degenerative neurological condition, giving him only two options: pay $1,800 per day to remain in a hospital after he was mistreated at a government-assigned agency home care center, or kill himself with life-ending drugs. The legalization of H.B. 47 would usher in the so-called “progressive” policies of Canada, ultimately leading to disabled people being included in future bills to kill themselves because they are given impossible choices such as the one Mr. Foley had.
Also, the unsafe life-ending drugs used in the killing of these terminally ill patients would force patients to agree to the below statement that they understand it could take longer than three hours of excruciating pain for them to finally be poisoned to death:
“I understand the full import of this request, and I expect to die if I self-administer the medical aid in dying medication prescribed. I further understand that although most deaths occur within three hours, my death may take longer.”
As Charlie Camosy, a bioethics professor in the theology department of Fordham University in New York said, “A medical system that kills is no longer recognizable as healing and caring.”
Here is a quick and informative video from the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition against H.B. 47:
ACTION ALERT:
H.B. 47 will be heard on Monday. However, the committee requires people to sign up 24 hours in advance to testify. Please sign up to testify by emailing SJC@nmlegis.gov with your Name, Entity Represented, Bill #, For or Against, and indicate if you wish to speak. Written comments are limited to 300 words or less. You will be contacted by our Zoom Operator with the virtual meeting instructions.
Your help in defeating this bill will mean the difference between a culture of life or a culture of careless death in New Mexico. We should champion policies that promote life for all people in New Mexico, from conception to natural death. Contact the committee members here:
- Joseph Cervantes (D), Chair, 505-397-8820, joseph@cervanteslawnm.com
- Bill B. O’Neill (D), Vice Chair, 505-397-8838, oneillsd13@billoneillfornm.com
- Cliff R. Pirtle (R), Ranking Member, 505-986-4369, cliff.pirtle@nmlegis.gov
- Gregory A. Baca (R), 505-986-4877, greg.baca@nmlegis.gov
- Katy M. Duhigg (D), 505-397-8823, katy.duhigg@nmlegis.gov
- Daniel A. Ivey-Soto (D), 505-397-8830, daniel.ivey-soto@nmlegis.gov
- Linda M. Lopez (D), 505-397-8833, linda.lopez@nmlegis.gov
- Mark Moores (R), 505-986-4856, mark.moores@nmlegis.gov
- Mimi Stewart (D), 505-397-8853, mimi.stewart@nmlegis.gov