Of Death and Dignity

In just four years, four States have passed ‘voluntary assisted dying’ laws to permit doctors to help ly ill patients kill themselves. In the two remaining States, Queensland and NSW, similar draft Bills await debate. ‘Dying with dignity’ rallies the supporters of these laws. Is it dignified to kill oneself? Is dignity lost in struggling on in pain and suffering? The story of an elderly woman who died from Alzheimer’s dementia offers some answers to these questions.

Of Alzheimer’s, an American doctor wrote more than thirty years ago, in a popular book about dying: ‘There is no dignity in this kind of death’^[1]. If you had chanced to walk into the elderly woman’s room, when she lay dying, you would have seen her wasted body unable to eat, drink or move herself, heard her speechless, ragged breathing, and looked at her static eyes. No dignity was on display.

Five years earlier, she lost her wedding and engagement rings. She had worn them every day of her married…