Ban on doctors killing their patients removed by Irish Medical Council

The Irish Medical Council has broken with Catholic moral  tradition and a code of medical ethics dating back over 2400 years to Hippocrates in Ancient Greece by lifting its ban on doctors deliberately killing patients.

David Quinn, the chief executive officer of The Iona Institute, a leading think-tank in Ireland, says:

The 2016 ‘Guide to Professional Conduct and Ethics for Medical Practitioners’ included the line: “You must not take part in the deliberate killing of a patient.” It was in the ‘End of Life Care’ section. This line is now gone and has not been replaced by anything similar.

It seems perfectly clear what is happening. If the Government legalises euthanasia, the ethics code for doctors will no longer get in the way.

It is important to note that the Minister for Health oversees appointments to the Medical Council. Very few members elected by doctors themselves. Notably, GPs were not consulted ahead of the change being made.

High profile Catholic couple die by euthanasia

Also, the recent deaths by euthanasia of Dries and Eugenie van Agt, the former Dutch prime minister and his wife, have been greeted with fawning sympathetic headlines worldwide.

There’s an unmistakable tone of rejoicing in a front page report in The Guardian newspaper, a British publication, which begins: “A Catholic former Dutch prime minister, Dries van Agt, has died by euthanasia, hand in hand with his wife Eugenie. They were both 93.” 

The underlying message is clear: Two respected Catholics at the venerable age of 93, have bravely and movingly resisted the Catholic Church and its condemnation of euthanasia.

Fr Thomas Crean, the author and Dominican friar, however, provides a sharply different narrative of their reported actions. Writing on X, formerly Twitter, he says:

“There can be few more horrific crimes than this: suicide, sharing in the suicide of one’s spouse, sharing in the murder by a ‘physician’ of oneself and one’s spouse; each sufficient to damn a man forever”.

Fr Crean is echoing the constant teaching of the Church found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church which teaches that direct euthanasia is:

“an act or omission which, of itself or by intention, causes death in order to eliminate suffering constitutes a murder gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and to the respect due to the living God, his Creator” (my emphasis).[2277]

Our response

We must not be intimidated  or silenced. Catholics, and pro-life people like ourselves need urgently  to follow Fr Thomas Crean’s example and “speak truth to power” – in this case, the power of the euthanasia lobby which has become more and more firmly entrenched in the media, judicial, medical and political establishments in western societies.

Family Life International is committed to providing its supporters with the arguments and moral support they need to fight euthanasia. We must all play our part in bringing about that collapse of the euthanasia lobby here in New Zealand.

The euthanasia lobby currently has huge power – but it’s a power which is based on hatred of human dignity, namely the value and inviolability of every human life. These are shaky foundations which, sooner or later, will collapse under the sheer weight of evidence – powerful personal testimonies like this one published this week, solid academic research – but above all by our prayers and sacrifices, particularly in this holy season of Lent.