The “Living Will”: Death Without Dignity

The “Living Will” - a document by which a person can give, in advance, a directive to have life-sustaining medical treatment withheld or discontinued at the time of future serious illness or injury - should be avoided by anyone who respects the sanctity of human life.

Why? Because “Living Wills” were conceived and designed by “right-to-die” (pro-euthanasia) organizations and have more to do with dying than living.  [In 1967, the first living will was written by the Euthanasia Society of America and attorney Luis Kutner.]  Signing a “Living Will” allows decisions about a patient's health care to be made by unknown medical personnel when the patient is not able to make these decisions. 

If these medical personnel believe the patient’s potential for recovery or "quality of life" is too low to warrent life saving measures, they may interpret the “Living Will” to mean whatever they consider appropriate to justify denial of treatments such as a ventilator or feeding tube.  [Read more]

Indeed, according to Dr. Brian Clowes, author of The Facts of Life (HLI), there are several problems with “Living Wills,” as follows:

1) The person usually signs it long before he knows if or when he will be incapacitated, or what the circumstances of that incapacitation will be. This means that the person cannot specify the desired details of his treatment for future medical conditions.

2) Changes to or revocation of a “Living Will” depend upon an individual’s condition. If he should experience a change of heart after he is incapable of communicating, he is out of luck.

3) If a person would like to change or revoke his “Living Will,” he may find that it is very difficult to locate all original and duplicated copies of the document.   [To revoke your “Living Will”, make sure that you destroy all the original copies, and as many duplicated copies as you can locate with relatives, medical personnel, and medical facilities.]

4) The wording of the original “Living Will” may remain the same, but the law governing its application may change. For example, Florida “Living Wills” now presume that patients refuse food and water unless otherwise specified - a fundamental change from the law’s original meaning (p. 115).

The Patient Self-Protection Document (available from IRLC) is an important alternative to the pro-euthanasia “Living Will.”  It is a durable power of attorney for health care that: counters the nationwide push to remove food and fluids from dying (and non-dying) patients; opposes euthanasia either by omission or commission; allows the appointment of a trusted agent to carry out one's Judeo-Christian beliefs regarding treatment/non-treatment if one is unable to do so.

Is the Patient Self-Protection Document necessary? Yes, and for two reasons:

1) There is an Illinois law entitled the Health Care Surrogate Act (also known as Life Sustaining Decisions Act), which allows for the removal of food and water from a terminal or non-terminal patient by directive of a surrogate designated by law.

2) The 1990 federal law, the Patient Self-Determination Act, requires any medical institution accepting Medicare and Medicaid funding to ask entering patients if they have an advance directive.  If the patient's answer is “no”,  an option to complete an advance directive is offered, usually a “Living Will” in standardized format. The patient is not obligated to complete an advance directive, but may feel pressured under such circumstances.  If the patient accepts the offer, the medical institution will record any advance directive signed by the patient.

To obtain printed copies of the Patient Self-Protection Document, or for additional information on the dangers of the “Living Will”, please contact Illinois Right to Life Committee at 312-422-9300 or by email at illinoisrighttolife@ameritech.net.