4-The writer draws the reader in with the stark headline “A Dignified Death” below that is a picture of the stories subject Dr Elizabeth Curry shown smiling and by the lakes that she loved in life; this is a particularly poignant picture as it shows how the disease can strike down anyone in their prime. There is also another picture showing Diane Pretty, Standing outside the House of Lords after her recent high profile court battle to have the right to die. The article is written with a very heartfelt hint of sadness at the current legislation regarding assisted suicide although I do not detect a direct appropriation of blame to any of the agencies and people involved, the article gives the feeling that this is a collective issue for our nation as opposed to for one or two government agencies. Overall the language used is simple and to the point ensuring that the text could be easily understood by anyone so inclined to read.
5-The main issues raised in this article are that if a dog or other animal is in pain or is suffering and cannot be cured, the dogs suffering is ended by lethal injection, this is viewed by many as the final act of compassion that an owner can afford to their pet, the writer asks the question why is this not the case with human beings, the writer also quite rightly mentions that there should be appropriate checks by qualified medical professionals that the person wishing to be euthanized is of sound mind and fully understands the ramifications of what they are asking for. The article also goes to great lengths to describe the aggressive way in which Motor Neurone disease attacks the body of its victim. And the point in case shows her mother going from being rather flippant at the beginning, to being a fighter and battling on in the face of the disease to slowly losing that independence that she had fought so hard to retain, indeed in the case of Mrs Curry she was left with basically no quality of life and she herself knew this was only going to get worse. As such she was faced with the choice of whether to burden her family with caring for her while she endured the most undignified of deaths, or weather to succumb to the illness on her own terms with dignity, the latter is what she chose and with the help of some pills and a pint of Gin and Tonic Mrs curry ended her suffering and died in the dignified why that she wanted. Now in the aftermath of her death the questions being asked now is why should patients be forced to make decisions like this alone for fear of incriminating any others involved, there is also the stigma of death by suicide which indeed can invalidate insurance policies and bring shame on families, the writer argues that in the free society in which we live we should all have the right to say “enough is enough” and to end our suffering and that of our families and do so with dignity and with the general acceptance that the cause of death was due to the illness in a hospital bed surrounded by ones own family rather than suicide which currently must be done in secret so as to not incriminate others.
6- The writers personal feelings are quite clear throughout the article, she very obviously feels bittern about the loss of her mother but from the article I think that she does not know who to blame, although she clearly apportioned blame to the failure of the support services to grant her mothers wishes, this is highlighted in the article with the quote “Surely in our advanced society we can devise a system of inquiry where a medical team examines separately each terminally ill persons wish to die” This quote highlights the bitterness that is first shown in another quote “The very logical law in this country allows us to put a distressed animal down, but we have to leave human beings in that position to soldier on.” Although these quotes as I said earlier both highlight the bitterness felt, the writer seems to accept that the past is indeed in the past and that the only way to ensure this situation is not repeated is to challenge the law in the courts. So although her stance is clear on assisted suicide, I still feel that perhaps she is looking for someone to blame for the death of her mother.
7- In my opinion the article was very effective in provoking thought on the subject and I gave much thought to this subject after I read the article, I found the article very touching and informative at the same time, the writer has achieved all that she set out to and perhaps more, hopefully now we can start to see positive debate in the issues raised and perhaps in the not to distant future the law lords will be made t reconsider the verdict that was given to Diane pretty and to perhaps at least remove some of the grey areas surrounding this controversial issue. Also worthy of note is the fact that this article highlights that people are more than capable of battling on through life even when afflicted by crippling and debilitating illness, this immense courage should give motivation to us all when it comes to traversing life’s many obstacles.
