On November first, cancer patient Brittany Maynard followed through on long-held plans to end her life.
Maynard made use of a controversial Oregon law permitting physician-assisted suicide. Maynard didn't want to subject herself — and her family — to the kind of suffering cancer patients can endure in the final days of their lives. With her husband's and family's blessing, Maynard set a date to die, and on that day took the lethal pills that ended her life.
Art Caplan, head of the division of ethics at NYU's Langone Medical Center, said physician-assisted suicide is no less controversial today than when Dr. Jack Kevorkian advocated for it in the 1990s. "Back in mid-nineties, Kevorkian maintained a public presence in the media, constantly, advocating (...) for assisted suicide," Caplan remembered. He added, "He was a pretty eerie figure."
Dr. Kevorkian became well-known — some say infamous — for facilitating the deaths of over a hundred patients seeking to end their lives. Kevorkian administered a lethal medication dose via two self-constructed devices, the "Thanatron," and the "Mercitron."
When Dr. Kevorkian ended up in court over physician-assisted suicide, Caplan testified against the manner in which Dr. Kevorkian handled his patients. "I said, look, [Dr.] Kevorkian doesn't know these people. (...) He's not even trying to talk them out of it, which I think is a key aspect in assistance in dying," Caplan said. "This is a guy who really enjoyed his work, and it was frightening to me to see that he kind of had a Svengali-like ability to get people to come to him."
Maynard, for her part, went to great pains to stress that it was her decision — made with the consent of her family — to end her life. She also being an advocate and poster-child for physician-assisted suicide. In a letter she penned for TheBrittanyFund.org, Maynard explained why she chose to die, and why having that choice was so critical.
Sadly, it is impossible to forget my cancer. Severe headaches and neck pain are never far away. (...) [M]y symptoms continue to worse as the tumor runs its course. However, I find meaning and take pride that the [physician-assisted suicide] movement is accelerating rapidly, thanks to supporters like you. (...) My dream is that every terminally ill American has access to the choice to die on their own terms with dignity.
Caplan wasn't sure whether Maynard would have a profound effect on Americans' opinion of physician-assisted suicide. "Oregon's had that law on the books now 17 years," Caplan said. "I don't know that she's going to change the pro and con of this fight."
Caplan did say the 29-year-old Maynard's story made a lasting impression on young people — the "young invincibles" in insurance industry parlance — who haven't fully thought about end-of-life issues for themselves. "She brought a whole new audience to the issue," Caplan said. "There are people next time that if they saw it on the ballot [they would vote for it] because they saw her."
