The Royal College of Pathologists has said it’s against current proposals to legalise assisted suicide, saying that its members should not qualified to review the decision-making process resulting in a person’s death.
The laws, should it pass, would require medical experts to look into the circumstances of an individual’s death. The Royal College of Pathologists denied having any moral or ethical position on the proposals but cited skilled concerns.
Dr Suzy Lishman, senior adviser on medical experts for the Royal College of Pathologists, said in a press release, “The college’s concerns relate only to the involvement of medical experts after an assisted death has taken place.
“As a part of their scrutiny, medical experts would wish to review the method leading as much as the choice to authorise an assisted death and the circumstances of the assisted death, which they should not qualified to do.
“Notification to the coroner following an assisted death would ensure independent judicial review, which is especially vital given the concerns raised by many individuals, organisations and medical royal colleges concerning the lack of adequate safeguards within the Bill for vulnerable people.”
She added, “Lawyers, not doctors, are probably the most appropriate professionals to review these deaths. The health worker system was implemented to detect problems with medical care, to not discover discrepancies or malintent within the legal process required for assisted deaths.”
Dr Lishman also noted that by giving medical experts these additional responsibilities, there’s potential for other areas of their work to suffer neglect.
Last month the Royal College of Psychiatrists got here out against the bill, saying it may very well be used to terminate the lives of individuals with treatable mental illnesses. The former chief coroner of England and Wales, Thomas Teague KC, has also expressed concerns, telling The Telegraph that the shortage of coroner involvement within the proposed laws opens the door to misfeasance.
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