Vulnerable people will be pressured into ending their lives unless we act NOW

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Dear
SPUC supporter,
ASSISTED SUICIDE AT THE GATES
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Anti-Life Labour MP Kim Leadbeater has raised a private member’s bill for assisted suicide. The bill was top of the ballot! The first reading is tomorrow on Wednesday 16th October, with a second reading scheduled for the 29^th November .

Thousands of vulnerable people living in Britain may soon face the same threat of death as babies in the womb.

We must act soon.

Assisted suicide is sold as "mercy killing," but in reality, it opens the door to widespread euthanasia and fuels a dangerous culture of death.
1. The commodification of life. Once it is ok to kill, the only decision is who you kill and why
2. Decline in investment in palliative care - killing is much cheaper
3. Pressure inevitably widens to include the simply elderly and alone, the homeless and those with mental illness, including eating disorders
4. Pressure on the vulnerable to end their lives as they are considered a “burden” to others
5. Pressure on doctors to engage in or promote killing


WE MUST ACT NOW BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE
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They have the sympathy of the mainstream media who are enthusiastically peddling their pro-death propaganda.

And they are actively working to introduce laws that will systematically result in the industrial-scale killing of the terminally ill and in some cases (Scotland) people with disabilities who are not dying – including children.

Currently, there are 4 DIFFERENT bids to change the law:
* England and Wales
* Scotland
* Jersey
* Isle of Man

Should new laws be passed, the number of people who will avail themselves of assisted suicide/euthanasia will quickly snowball. We know this from the examples of where it has already been legalised.

In Canada, for instance, where the law changed in 2016, annual deaths grew from a little over 1,000 deaths in the first year of the Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) law to 13,241 deaths in 2022.
Not just that.

Almost half (46%) of the people killed by assisted suicide in the US state of Oregon in 2022 reported they felt they were a “burden” on family members or carers.

Do you see how that works?

A new British law would quickly EXPAND and WIDEN as has been the trend in other countries where assisted suicide legislation has been introduced.

Expect new eligibility categories to be added (such as mental health conditions), more people to succumb to pressure/guilt to kill themselves with each passing year and doctors (and even nurses) compelled to euthanise patients or face severe penalties.

Assisted Suicide and the Demographic Crisis:

Abortion and assisted suicide are two sides of the same coin. Population experts are in a panic about the coming demographic crisis, and euthanasia offers them a way out. The Marie Stopes “Manifesto” (2024) states we must: “Recognise that there is no right or wrong number of children or births, just as there is no right or wrong number of abortions across the population. The UK’s ageing population requires a thoughtful policy response and cannot be solved using women’s bodies.”

It is the anti-family, anti-life agenda of the abortionists which have left the elderly increasingly isolated and alone. For the anti-life elites, killing is simply cheaper than caring. People are only valuable as utilitarian economic units.

But people do not want killing, they want high-quality palliative care, good hospitals and readily available hospice accommodation.

Samaritans issue a “wake-up call for the Government”

In August, Samaritans tweeted that recently published Office for National Statistics data showed that SUICIDE RATES in England and Wales for last year (2023) were the highest in over TWO decades.

To mark World Suicide Day Jake Richards penned an article in the Worksop Guardian entitled: “Let's make sure we work together to turn the tide on male suicide”

Mr Richards wrote:

“​The rising rate of male suicide is a quietly unfolding crisis. During an average week, 80 men will take their own lives.

​Now a leading cause of death for men under 50, each suicide is a tragedy that devastates families and communities across the country.

World Suicide Prevention Day is an opportunity to begin addressing this epidemic. That is why I held a reception in Parliament this week…to promote and support grassroot organisations that are central to supporting men in their darkest hour.”

Yet, by authoring an assisted suicide Bill Mr Richards will clearly FUEL the UK’s suicide epidemic

Research published in 2022 in the Journal of Ethics in Mental Health suggests that countries that legalise assisted suicide also see an overall increase in non-assisted suicide due to mental health conditions.

The study, Euthanasia, Assisted Suicide and Suicide Rates in Europe looked at data on assisted suicide and euthanasia and self-induced suicides between 1990 and 2016 in the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland.

The data were then compared to countries where assisted suicide has not been legalised.

The findings showed that:
* NO European country which practices euthanasia or assisted suicide has seen a reduction in overall suicide rates
* In the Netherlands the rates of non-assisted suicide have INCREASED since the law was changed.

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Meanwhile, north of the border, MSP Liam McArthur’s Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill is currently before Holyrood.

The McArthur Bill would allow those aged 16 or over, deemed to be ‘terminally ill’ and who have been resident in Scotland for at least twelve months, to seek assistance to kill themselves.

But ‘terminally ill’ is so broadly defined that the Bill would qualify people with conditions which are NOT terminal but rather:

“… an advanced and progressive disease, illness or condition from which they are unable to recover and that can reasonably be expected to cause their premature death”.

The definition could be interpreted to include heart disease and progressive neurological conditions (such as dementia), clinical depression and anxiety.

Eating disorders (ED) such as anorexia would qualify too.

In Oregon, USA, assisted suicides have been approved for conditions such as anorexia, hernias, and arthritis, while in Belgium and the Netherlands, patients with eating disorders were considered eligible for euthanasia as their conditions were deemed ‘hopeless’ or ‘untreatable’.

A study published in July in the Frontiers in Psychiatry journal found that at least 60 patients with Eating Disorders such as anorexia and bulimia were killed by assisted suicide/euthanasia between 2012 and 2024 in countries where the condition does NOT legally qualify for an assisted death.

Veteran American pro-lifer Wesley J. Smith describes these cases as the “abandonment” of people with disabilities who are NOT dying.

He points to the Joint Statement Against Assisted Suicide for Eating Disorders from Eat Breathe Thrive, an international group helping people overcome eating disorders, which insists that:
1. Eating disorders are treatable conditions but often long waiting lists, costs and shortage of health care specialists make accessing treatment difficult
2. The assertion that EDs are incurable or terminal is unsupported by science
3. The term “terminal anorexia” is NOT recognised by any formal medical body, and has been widely rejected by researchers and clinicians

The Oregon situation alone must lead us to seriously question reassurances made by our opponents here that legal safeguards built into British law would prevent such abuses from impacting vulnerable people in the UK.

This is being pushed on an unwilling public by the euthanasia lobby

According to a poll of 2,000 British adults published this summer by Whitestone Insight, the public is conflicted about passing a new law and harbours some serious doubts about the ability of legal “safeguards” to prevent abuses:
* A majority (56%) of those who supported legalising assisted suicide in principle felt there are “too many complicating factors” to make it a practical and safe option to implement in Britain.
* Legalising assisted suicide is NOT a political priority for most people. It ranked 23 out of 24 of issues that need attention, with “regulating AI” and “international trade deals” ranking higher.
* Only four per cent of those polled thought it should be a priority for politicians.

I want to break the spell being cast by the media about assisted suicide on the British public.
* It is NOT popular or necessary
* Legal “safeguards” will NOT prevent vulnerable people from being coerced into being killed
* Once it is legalised AS deaths accelerate quickly year-on-year

Take Canada, where the notorious MAiD law now accounts for more than 4% of ALL Canadian deaths each year – with 15,000 assisted suicides alone in 2023.

There is still everything to play for…

Unusually, the Cabinet Secretary has written to all Ministers to say that they can vote how they wish, which given the Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer supports the Bill, is an indication perhaps that Ministers are also free to vote against, as well as to vote for or to abstain.

This means that every letter, email, advertisement and broadcast will count towards the impending votes. But all of this promotion is expensive – for example, we are about to launch full page announcements in The Catholic Herald.

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Alex Schadenberg + Party Conference

Veteran Canadian anti-euthanasia campaigner Alex Schadenberg knows better than most how much vulnerable Canadians have suffered under MAiD.

Alex recently visited the UK as a guest of SPUC attending conferences in London and Glasgow and addressed healthcare professionals and journalists.

SPUC staff attended the recent Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrats and Reform Party conferences.

We were able to discuss the problems of changing the law with MPs, journalists and others with influence in the AS debate.

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If we are to break our opponents’ stranglehold on the AS narrative, YOUR financial support will be critical.

Will you give £10 or £15 or £25 or £50 or £100 or £250 or £500 or £1,000 or £5,000 or more to help quash our opponents’ false narrative and BLOCK any assisted suicide law?

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Thank you for your vital support.

Yours in defence of life

John Deighan
Chief Executive

PS: With multiple bids to introduce assisted suicide in Britain pending we must act NOW or it will be too late:
* Vulnerable people will be pressured to end their own lives
* The scale of the killing will quickly accelerate
* People who are NOT dying will be coerced into opting for an assisted suicide death.

Sick people in Canada – where assisted suicide/euthanasia deaths have rocketed from 1,018 to 13,241 in the first five years – are being asked to seek MAiD rather than receiving medical treatment.

Kathrin Mentler, a 37-year-old Canadian woman with a history of self-harm, was offered MAiD instead of seeing a psychiatrist after being told there were no hospital beds.

Ms Mentler went to the hospital for help, filled out forms, and shared her mental health struggles with a clinician. She wanted to stay overnight to be treated by a psychologist but was instead asked if she had considered MAiD.

The people of the UK deserve a future better than this.

Britain must NOT become another Canada.

The clock is ticking.

I strongly urge you to respond to this crucial appeal TODAY.

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