By Kim Vo - Mercury News
Wednesday, May 18, 2005
When she was diagnosed with a terminal disease, Joe Ramos' wife was determined not to let the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis fully run its course. ``She wanted to slip away'' when she grew too dependent, he said.
But there was no legal way to let that happen. So Margaret Ramos starved herself for 29 days, her husband said, until finally dying April 6.
Her lingering death spurred the Half Moon Bay man to throw his support behind Assembly Bill 654. Modeled after Oregon's so-called ``physician-assisted suicide'' law, the bill would allow terminally ill adults in California to ask their doctors for a lethal prescription.
``If this legislation had been in place, she could have had her family around her and said her goodbyes directly and sweetly,'' Ramos said of his wife. ``And she would have been gone.''
The bill's supporters launched a kick-off campaign this week, with stops in Los Angeles, San Diego and, on Tuesday, San Jose. The Assembly Appropriations Committee is expected to hold a hearing on the bill today.
Opponents plan rallies in Los Angeles and Sacramento today. They've already mailed 50,000 postcards to Assembly members voicing their concerns, said Tim Rosales, spokesman for Californians Against Assisted Suicide.
The bill barely survived a different committee last month, an indication of the nation's division over how life should end. A Gallup poll released this week indicates 59 percent of Americans would consider ``ending their life by some painless means'' if they were in severe pain and had an incurable disease.
Opponents argue that doctors betray their oath when they actively help their patients die, said Dr. Rex Greene, a Peninsula oncologist who speaks on behalf of the California Medical Association, which opposes the bill. Doctors can offer medication to ease the pain, he said, without going so far as to write lethal prescriptions.
``This is a disaster in the making,'' said Greene, who worries that the poor and uninsured will be unfairly swayed to hasten their deaths.
Greene worried about ``subtle pressure on people: Instead of putting my family through this and possibly losing our homes, I'm going to see Dr. X down the street.''
``There's nothing in this law that prevents Jack Kevorkian clones from doing this,'' he added, referring to the imprisoned Michigan doctor who helped dozens of patients die.
But the bill's supporters say safeguards are built into the bill; for instance, patients must have less than six months to live and be evaluated by two doctors. They say Oregon -- where 208 people have died with a doctor's help since that state's law was approved in 1997 -- proves the legislation won't be abused.
An additional 139 people had requested lethal doses from their doctors but didn't use the medication, said Barbara Roberts, Oregon's former governor, who has been campaigning on behalf of AB 654.
``They want the choice,'' she said of terminal patients. ``They want to know if it gets too debilitating for them . . . they can exit.''
Rosales, of Californians Against Assisted Suicide, said those numbers offer a good reason the bill shouldn't be passed.
``If there's not that many,'' he asked, ``why the rush to do this?''
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