Ireland, U.K. becoming ‘dangerous’ for people with disabilities

Disability rights advocates in Ireland and the United Kingdom are explaining why they oppose legalized assisted suicide, even for individuals who are deemed ‘terminal.’

Dr. Margaret Kennedy penned an op-ed for the Irish Independent in which she stated her belief that persons with disabilities in Ireland are in danger of “euthanasia by stealth.” And in the UK, Merry Cross wrote for OpenDemocracy that she “is scared” of the nation’s assisted suicide bill.

Ireland

In October, the Irish Parliament’s lower house voted to “take note” of a report from the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Assisted Dying, which recommended allowing assisted suicide for Irish adult citizens who are suffering “intolerably” with a terminal illness and have six months or less to live, or 12 months (or less) for those with neurodegenerative conditions. By November 8, the bill, entitled an “Act to establish a legal framework for assisted dying in Ireland,” had failed — at least for now, as the assisted suicide debate continues.

Alongside that debate, the Cost of Disability in Ireland report found that the additional costs associated with being a disabled person in Ireland added up to between €8,700 and €10,000 per year in 2021. With inflation, the Disability Federation of Ireland estimates that the additional cost of living has since risen to about €10,397 and €15,177 per year. Ireland’s Budget for 2025 was reported to include “one-off” payments to help people with disabilities with the additional costs they face. But according to Kennedy, those ‘payments’ are inadequate.

“The cost of living for disabled people, sick or older persons in Ireland is three times more compared to the general population. Disabled people have been calling for a recurring ‘cost of living disability payment’ for decades and they are still not being heard. This year it was again denied,” said Kennedy.

She continued, “Many of us who are sick, old and disabled feel that we are now living in a dangerous country. … They used to say children should be seen and not heard. For me, the Budget last month felt like that: cold, distant, like we had no voice.” She told the prime minister that she does not “feel seen.”

Kennedy argued that Ireland is “among the worst countries in the EU for the rates of poverty experienced by disabled people” and that it is a “national shame and scandal” that Ireland continues to fail to address the issue of disability poverty and lack of services. She said that any proposed assisted dying legislation will only serve to further “erode services, reduce palliative care investment, and create a major damaging, psychological impact on vulnerable groups.”

She continued, “Many doctors in Ireland, and groups representing disabled people and older people, are not in favour of assisted dying legislation. They have deep concerns about what happened in Belgium, the Netherlands and Canada which have seen expansion upon expansion of the grounds for assisted suicide and euthanasia. Diminishing services prolong and increase older, disabled and sick people’s suffering to the extent that many now feel they can no longer live a valuable and productive life.”

She referred to it as “euthanasia by stealth.”

“When you’re disabled, the psychological harm of living in a country when it’s increasingly hard to lead an active, meaningful life is enormous. Many not able to hang on will make a choice to die rather than fight,” she said.

Rachel Clarke, a specialist in hospital palliative care, noted, “My concern is that if we change the law [to allow physician-assisted death] without adequate resourcing of palliative care, then there will be people who chose to end their lives because they weren’t being provided with the care they needed.”

And in fact, this is happening in Canada already.

The UK

According to The Guardian, the same concern about legalized assisted suicide and lack of palliative care exists in England and Wales. Just last week, British lawmakers voted in the House of Commons to pass a bill allowing assisted suicide for people who are given just six months to live, marking what the Catholic Herald called “one of the greatest betrayals of the vulnerable in society in recent history.”

That bill must now survive Parliament before it can become law.

Merry Cross wrote at OpenDemocracy:

Some might assume that disabled people would be breathing a sigh of relief at the thought of MPs backing the ‘assisted dying bill’ on 29 November, or conversely that it has nothing to do with us. Neither is true.

I was born with a significant impairment which means, among other things, that I have known pain and injuries all my life. I, like most disabled people, have enormous compassion for those whose lives end in serious pain.

It needn’t be like this. Like many other disabled people, I believe money and effort should be put into assisting us to live with dignity before it is spent on our deaths.

She said she has seen “cut after cut to our benefits,” including the availability of caregivers. These cuts have resulted in “hundreds of deaths.”

In addition, she and other disabled individuals “haven’t forgotten how during the pandemic, disability rights charities reported doctors issuing an ‘unprecedented’ number of ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ orders to people with learning difficulties, without any consultation with the patient or family.”

Cross noted, “The impact of all this is that both disabled people and our families become more likely to see ourselves as burdens. Some of us may feel that we might want out, via assisted suicide/dying.”

As Cross writes, doctors don’t often “accurately predict[] the length of time a patient will live.” In fact, it is “something they fail to do in half of cases, according to data analysis by Paddy Stone, emeritus professor of palliative and end of life care at University College London…”

Like Kennedy, Cross called it “a very dangerous time for” people with disabilities.

“When the standard of living drops as low as it has for so many people, with costs rising constantly, disabled people are rapidly cast as financial burdens on society and as being of less value than others,” Cross wrote. “This is why Disabled People Against Cuts is urging the government to not help us die, but #AssistUsToLive.”

[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by Live Action News.]