They Shoot Horses, Don't They?

Dr Anne Turner was a 66-year-old retired medical practitioner who lived in Bath, just a few miles from my location. She was suffering from a disease called PSP - don't ask what it means, I couldn't pronounce it, let alone spell it. Suffice it to say that it is an incurable degenerative disease. Dr Turner was still able to walk and talk, albeit slurred. But she knew that it was only a matter of time before she became totally dependent on those around her for her every need. It would soon be that she could not stand up, let alone walk. She would even lose the ability to swallow so presumably would then have to be fed intravenously. Being a medic, she knew all about these symptoms of her disease and decided, while still in full control of all her faculties, that this was not for her. She wanted to end it before she became too helpless and totally dependent. The law in the UK is clear. Suicide is illegal. Helping someone to commit suicide is illegal. I have no doubt that Dr Turner thought long and hard before taking her final step. Her own medical career must have been based on saving life, not taking it. The Hypocratic oath which all doctors take puts the sanctity of life above all other things. The Christian faith, along with most others, believes that only God has the power of life and death over us.
I am scared of dying. But I think I would also be very scared if I knew I was going to die of this or a similar disease. I would wonder who would make the final decision on whether to stop feeding me and let me die. Would it be my wife or sons? What a burden to put on them. I don't know if I could take that decision if it were one of my loved ones in that situation. I wouldn't want them to suffer but it would take some real heart-searching to say "Let them die," however much the humanitarian angle said it was time.
In Switzerland they have an organisation called Dignitas. It assists people to take their own lives in such cases. It does not do it lightly, but counsels the patient so that he or she has accepted all the consequences of either staying alive or taking the suicide route. Dr Turner went there in the end after a campaign in this country to try to get the law changed. She was still cogent, could still talk, could still walk. She had the luxury of still being able to think it through for herself. She asked the BBC to film her as part of the ongoing campaign to legalise assisted suicide here. She travelled with her son and daughters and we saw her in the apartment where it was to happen, sitting at a table and taking refreshment with her children. They supported her to the end, which must be probably the hardest thing they had done in their lives. But they knew that it was really what their mother wanted. Anne Turner died of a self-administered overdose of barbiturates, peacefully and quickly - probably the way she yearned to.
Let's hope that the British police don't even think of prosecuting the son and daughters (as they could) for assisting her.
It's a strange world where, if a racehorse breaks a leg they shoot it "to save it suffering". Did they ask the horse? No, of course not. Where is the sanctity of life there? Or is it just that it would be too much bother to look after a lame horse which won't win them any money?
Once again I don't know the answers. Once again much greater minds than mine wrestle with the problem and still they don't know either. Surely the only person who really knows is the sufferer.