AB 2747, End-of-life care
OPPOSE 

Assembly Members Patti Berg and Lloyd Levine are again advancing the assisted suicide agenda with their latest bill AB 2747, End-of-life care. This bill is currently before the California State Assembly. There are major problems with this bill.

       AB 2747 would allow health care providers to determine if a patient has less than a year to live. AB 2747 defines    
        “health care provider” as including nurse practitioners and physician assistants. Are such medical personnel
        qualified to make a prognosis of less than a year to live?  AB 2747 is altering medical profession standards
        beyond its purview.

        AB 2747 requires a health care provider who diagnoses a patient with a terminal condition having one year to live to discuss end of life options with that patient if the patient so desires. This is premature and unnecessary. Premature in that hospice care itself is not offered to a terminal patient until 6 months before projected death. Unnecessary in that Health and Safety Code Section 1749(d)(1) already makes optional end of life counseling available to patients who desire it.

       AB 2747 includes palliative sedation and voluntary stopping of eating and drinking (VSED) as “pain control”. These cause death. VSED is patient suicide while palliative sedation used in this manner is assisted suicide. The medical profession considers palliative sedation appropriate only in rare situations when treating intractable symptoms during the final hours or days of life, not as proposed by AB 2747. By codifying palliative sedation and VSED as legitimate pain control measures, AB 2747 would open the door to their use in hospice and the medical profession.

        AB 2747 would require a health care provider who refuses a patient’s request of such procedures to transfer the patient to another physician or organization that would accommodate the patient’s request. That organization could be a pro- suicide group such as Compassion and Choices, the sponsor of previous Berg/ Levine assisted suicide bills and a proponent of AB 2747.

       AB 2747  creates situations where cost considerations could affect treatment options. The British Medical Journal
       published an article in March 2008 noting that palliative care is costly, while sedation is relatively inexpensive. Once
       again, in the midst of California’s health-care crisis, AB 2747 dangerously links cost considerations to life and
      death decisions.

      AB 2747 should be rejected; it has no legitimate place in medical treatment or hospice. Contact your
      legislators and ask them to vote NO or Abstain from voting on this bill until these problem are corrected.