Anti-euthanasia campaigner to visit New Zealand next week

UK author and anti-euthanasia campaigner to visit New Zealand next week

Dr Kevin Yuill, author of Assisted Suicide: The Liberal, Humanist Case against Legalization and anti-euthanasia campaigner from the UK, is visiting New Zealand next week for two days. He will give public lectures in Auckland, Hamilton and Wellington and is available for comment.

Dr Yuill thinks that changing the law on assisted suicide is not the right decision for New Zealand.

“I hope that Lecretia Seales will be able to die the death she wants. I would have no great problem if she and her doctor came to a private agreement,” he says. “What I object to is the legal precedent set. It seems to be a way of avoiding the debate rather than having the discussion in parliament.”

“If Ms Seales’ attempt is successful, the value of human life would no longer be equal. Whereas it is now equally wrong to kill a 24-year-old and an 86-year-old, other questions will then undermine that equality.”

He argues that:

1. The legalisation of ‘assisted dying’ would reduce individual freedom and privacy.

2. Assisted suicide legislation would normalise voluntary death and contradict suicide prevention.

3. It is impossible to contain legal assisted suicide to any one group of people - for example, the terminally ill with less than a year to live - because suffering is subjective.

He will be speaking on "The Myths behind the Case for Legal Assisted Suicide";

in Auckland on Sunday the 24th

in Hamilton on Monday the 25th

and in Wellington on Tuesday the 26th of May.

ENDS

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