29 and Euthanized: Dark News from the Netherlands

Recent news from the Netherlands illustrates how its euthanasia regime is among the world’s most permissive. It shows no signs of slowing down. Aurelia Browers, a 29-year-old mentally ill woman, was granted her wish and euthanized last weekend, demonstrating the slippery slope confronting those countries in which euthanasia and assisted-suicide laws are becoming ever laxer.

Evidence suggests that Dutch physicians do not consistently follow the protocols intended to regulate the practice. News of Browers’s death follows grisly reports that an elderly woman with dementia was involuntarily euthanized in the Netherlands. In neighboring Belgium, laws exist that allow for children to be euthanized.

Cases in the Netherlands show the most troubling reality of euthanasia laws: their widening use based on subjective criteria. Euthanasia is advertised as “dignified death” for those suffering from a terminal illness. But the euthanizing of a young woman on grounds that she suffered from a mental illness shows the false advertising of the “death with dignity” movement. When an apparently healthy young adult can legally end her life because of her mental illness, it raises legitimate questions of where that trajectory ends. Where the practice is prohibited, advocates are quick to highlight stories of bone-jarringly sad situations of patients with perhaps a neurological cancer slowly crippling their cognitive and physical abilities. Testimonials from family members are promoted to tug at heartstrings, appealing to lawmakers to pass laws that enable loved ones to be relieved of their suffering.

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