Letters to the editor for Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Nevada should pass doctor-assisted suicide bill

One of the many things the Nevada Legislature will be voting on is doctor-assisted death. A prescription for misery that’s long overdue.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu probably said it best: “In refusing dying people the right to die with dignity, we fail to demonstrate the compassion that lies at the heart of Christian values.”

Each day in Nevada, people all over suffer because of some incurable, heart-wrenching-to-watch malady of the body. If it’s not that, they might have to watch a relative or close friend slowly and painfully being eaten away on the inside.

Doctors cannot do very much for dying individuals, except maybe give them more drugs to ease their pain or to make them feel just a little more comfortable until the end comes.

But it’s really not their death, but the misery a terminally ill person has to go through as they lay wishing their pain would stop before death does finally come.

With doctor-assisted death, the pain and suffering and the worry can stop. A family can rest at night knowing their loved one has passed on and they’re finally at peace.

What more beautiful of a thing, other than life itself, can there possibly be than to have a doctor who’s compassionate enough to send a suffering person off to a better place while loved ones comfort and hold them by their hand before finally succumbing to their doctor-assisted drugs?

This really needs to be passed by legislation. But that’s just my opinion.

Donald Paetz

Carson City