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July 2, 2015

Euthanasia’s Open Season on the Mentally Ill

Helping the mentally ill commit suicide was unthinkable not long ago. Today, it is a growing practice.

In the Netherlands, for example, psychiatrists legally kill their patients with the approval of colleagues and the culture. Indeed, the Dutch Journal of Psychiatry has encouraged psychiatrists to euthanize patients with severe mental illnesses...

Netherlanders responded positively to their “emancipation”: The number of euthanasia deaths of the mentally ill rose from fourteen in 2012 to forty-two in 2013. Not coincidentally, a just-released study  reports that 34 percent of the country’s general practitioners would consider euthanizing a mentally ill patient.

Belgium is even more enthusiastic than the Netherlands about euthanizing those with psychiatric illnesses. The most well-known case is that of Godelieva De Troyer, who was euthanized by oncologist and palliative medicine professor Wim Distelmans. De Troyer did not have cancer; after a lifelong struggle with depression, she consulted with Distelmans (now a famous euthanasia doctor and advocate) for the sole purpose of being made dead.

Click here for the originating article from Wesley Smith.