Netherlands Euthanasia Group Wants Suicide Clinics

Two pieces of news from The Netherlands, the country with the longest and most extreme history of  caring out acts of assisted suicide and euthanasia.    The Dutch government released its 2009 report which reveals a 13% increase in deaths by euthanasia or assisted suicide.    There were 2,636 cases of patients being killed or being helped to kill themselves, accounting for 2% of all Dutch deaths.    Most of the deaths were direct killing by euthanasia.

But, being the world champ at killing people isn’t enough for the Dutch proponents.   Apparently envious of their Swiss counterparts who openly operate suicide clinics, the Dutch Association for a Voluntary End to Life (NVEE) wants to establish its own suicide clinics.  The reason?  They want to extend the death “benefit” to those who are not terminally ill.    Targeted are patients who have dementia, or ones who feel they have “completed” their lives and just want to die.   The latter fit the new category of people “tired of living,” a concept being widely promoted in Europe.

Our friend Alex Schadenberg of the Canadian Euthanasia Prevention Coalition points out there may be a profit motive.   The individual who established and runs the Swiss suicide clinics has become quite wealthy.   Suicide clinic services in Switzerland can run up to $8,000 per patient.

Our friend Wesley Smith says:  “There is no denying the evidence that euthanasia consciousness leads to a broader culture of death that eventually accpets all comers….their logic is impeccable.  Once killing is considered an acceptable answer to human suffering, nihilism is unleashed and the ‘what’ that causes ’suffering’ ceases to matter.”

Ominous news indeed.

Barbara Lyons