New Victorian dying laws risk wrongful deaths

Former AMA vice-president Stephen Parnis says new euthanasia laws pose a big risk.

Former Australian Medical Association vice-president Stephen Parnis.

Former Australian Medical Association vice-president Stephen Parnis says the fact 68 “so-called safeguards” were seen as a necessary part of Victoria’s new voluntary assisted dying laws demonstrates the risk they pose of inflicting wrongful deaths.

Dr Parnis and former AMA president Mukesh Haikerwal say none of the concerns they raised when the Andrews government introduced the legislation into the Victorian parliament in 2017 have been addressed.

They and fellow former AMA president, geriatrician Mark Yates, lobbied Victorian MPs at the time, warning the state would be heading down a “misguided, dangerous path” if assisted dying were made legal.

They continue to back the AMA and World Medical Association’s opposition to euthanasia and yesterday expressed fear that other states and territories may follow in Victoria’s footsteps.

Voluntary assisted dying became legal in Victoria yesterday, with more than 120 doctors including GPs, cancer and palliative care specialists having undertaken mandatory training to qualify them to assess a patient’s eligibility for the scheme.

Under the new laws, medicos and care providers have the right to conscientiously object to helping a patient end their life — a right emergency physician Dr Parnis intends to exercise. “The fact 68 so-called safeguards are required continues to demonstrate that there are many places where the safeguards have the potential to fail, and in this area a failure means a wrongful death,” he said.

“In order to satisfy the needs or demands of a number of people to be able to take their own life when they choose, we are putting many more frail, vulnerable, dying people at risk.”

Dr Parnis said he feared situations in which patients may receive an inaccurate diagnosis or prognosis that could result in a wrongful decision being made to end their lives.

Dr Parnis called for better funding for palliative care, taking offence at the notion that the availability of euthanasia meant people could now die with dignity.

“The word ‘dignity’ is bandied about here, as if dignity at the end of life hasn’t existed until this day,” he said. “I’ve assisted thousands of people at the end of their life over 27 years of medical practice. Dignity does not require a lethal potion.

“Other states in Australia should be in no hurry to take this on. I think this legislation and the way it operates should be subject to enormous scrutiny.”

Dr Haikerwal, chair of the Council of the World Medical Association, shared Dr Parnis’s concerns.

“The problem of a lack of access to good palliative care has been highlighted in this debate, yet we’ve not seen any increase in funding,” he said.

The AMA under then president Michael Gannon expressed “grave concerns” about Victoria’s Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill in 2017 and opposed it, but recognised there are divergent views within the medical profession and the broader community in relation to euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide.

An AMA spokeswoman yesterday said the organisation’s position had not changed.