AB 374 would have turned doctors into killers

Contact:  Campaign for Children and Families Agency Contact, 530-405-4095 ext. 2

SACRAMENTO, June 7 /Christian Newswire/ -- Campaign for Children and Families, a leading California-based pro-family organization, is pleased that the physician-assisted suicide bill has died without a vote in the California State Assembly.

AB 374 lacked enough votes for passage in the Democrat-controlled Assembly before this week's legislative deadline for bills to pass their house of origin. Heavy lobbying was done against AB 374 by Life Priority Network, Californians Against Assisted Suicide, and a host of experts and concerned citizens.

"Doctors should be healers, not killers," said Campaign for Children and Families (CCF) President Randy Thomasson. "Jack Kevorkian may be on the loose again, but the defeat of this suicide bill means 'Dr. Death' won't be employed in California anytime soon."

"Everyone who respects innocent human life should be grateful that California has resisted placing lethal weapons into the hands of physicians," said Thomasson. "Depressed patients need love, family, spiritual counsel, and proven pain medication, not handed what amounts to a gun to the head. Because HMOs are the controlling force for so many physicians, assisted suicide would inevitably lead to hospitals and hospices viewing patients as more expensive alive than dead."

"The compassionate answer for ‘terminal’ patients is effective pain management, not suicide," said Thomasson. "God created us, and no innocent human being between womb and tomb deserves to be murdered, no matter what it's called. Legalizing so-called 'voluntary' assisted suicide today will lead to involuntary suicide tomorrow, like what's currently happening in hospitals in the Netherlands."

Thomasson warned that despite AB 374's defeat, government advance health care directives and other "living will" forms should be avoided. "The standard advance health care directive unfortunately defines food and water as 'medical treatment.' This is a terrible lie that leads to a horrible death. If you sign an advance health care directive and fall unconscious, you could shrivel to death by forced dehydration."

Campaign for Children and Families encourages Californians who disagree with suicide to use the "Will to Live" legal form, which defines food and water as basic necessities, thus protecting individuals from death by starvation and dehydration. The Will to Live, created by the National Right to Life Committee, is available for free to residents of all 50 states. The Will to Live can be downloaded at www.savecalifornia.com.

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