I sympathize with the man, and the woman. If I were on the jury, and I was convinced she had wanted to die, I’d acquit. The sticky part for me: did she indeed want to die? I would feel much better about that if the man had solicited her opinion on videotape (and even better if witnesses were there being taped as well). As things stand, we have to take his opinion. He might have exactly the right take on what she would have said. Or maybe she would have said, “gosh, if it means leaving my kids, I don’t wanna die. Or I want the chance to say goodbye on my own terms. Or I want one more year.” I don’t want to punish this man, I think he did what he did out of love; but I don’t want this to become a trend where people turn out the lights on loved ones without first getting easy-to-produce evidence that the deceased really truly wanted it.
Not necessary. Without any O2, you won’t be awake long enough to have any CO2 buildup. Three deep breaths and you will be asleep, and dead in five minutes or less unless someone interrupts it. Though if one were really concerned, one would build a tent (or less elegantly, use a trash bag open on the bottom so the CO2 will settle out.) Helium is more traditional than nitrogen, but either will work. The “helium hood” technique is what’s recommended by the Hemlock Society in their book, Final Exit.
Are oxygen concentrators registered over there? More than guns?
Oh yes I can. My partner of over 30 years died slowly of esophagal cancer. She starved to death because she could not swallow. We had one of these oxygen concentrators. Being in the UK, it was delivered, and installed for free under the NHS. They even paid for the electricity it used. I could not have used that particular machine because it was not mine to modify. But they are easy to get. Hobbyists buy second hand ones to generate oxygen for miniature cutting torches when they are no longer up to specification for healthcare.
This was the solution I had prepared should I be asked to do the deed. I did not do it, but It should be pretty foolproof and merciful. If someone else in my position searches for how to do it, they may find this thread if nothing better exists, which is why I post it. Perhaps the subject would have found another way if I had posted before.
My apologies for the shock factor answer. Probably a bit more then you were expecting. But there you go.
But handguns? I suppose it is quick if you do it right. But it is not very nice, is it?
I suppose I didn’t think of it that way, probably thinking too mechanically. But yeah, that sounds right. Helium is also easier to get your hands on.
The oxygen concentrators absorb the nitrogen. If there is any carbon dioxide present, then that comes out with the oxygen feed, not the nitrogen exhaust.
I learned of the effects of nitrogen inhalation when I heard of an incident on a large laser at work. This took a huge amount of liquid nitrogen to cool - many tons - and three people were working in the void under the building, and collapsed. They were rescued and were fine, but they remembered breathing normally and then nothing. A Minerva oxygen level alarm was added soon after this.
I later saw a Horizon program where Michael Portillo discussed breathing nitrogen as an option for mercy killing and an alternative to the various execution methods in the US. This may be it…
I hate to ruin the party, but there are several ways to get your meds if you can’t afford them. Talking to your doctor would be a good start, and there are also several ways to get a PCP in every economic bracket.
This is not to blame the shooter. Most people don’t even know the programs that are available. (Guess what happened to the budget for educating the public.) As an insurance guy, I’m sending people all the time to Medicaid, LIS, and other free options. I don’t get paid for that, except by karma. The greatest tragedy here is that the wife could have gotten her meds, if she had made a few phone calls.
Helium? Well, it is available, but it is not sustainable. Do you have enough? How much is in a cylinder? How much flow do you need? I am not sure I could have got all these things right. And what happens to the people upstairs in the same building? Or the people who go into the room afterwards? If you use the oxygen concentrator, you have an endless supply of nitrogen at similar or greater flow rates to the oxygen; while the gas balance within the room and outside it, remains exactly the same.
Also, any last words won’t be very dignified.
But if the atmosphere has positive pressure and/or is circulating isn’t the volume of it irrelevant to a certain extent (clearly you would need enough volume to pressurize a mask and create positive pressure, especially if the mask was venting)? Wouldn’t the CO2 be pushed out with excess inert gas in a positive pressure mask, or circulated back into a reserve if it was circulating?
Well, duh.
I mean… What the hell is moral about insurance companies profiting off of people’s pain and misery and death? Nothing.
What’s moral about proclaiming the “superiority” of a free market system, where the buyers aren’t given the right to know the prices, or the wherewithal to shop around for the best deal? If you’re in the ambulance dying, you go to the nearest place that can help. It’s absurd that anyone has to face bankruptcy for this shit. It’s immoral. It’s a human need that can’t be handled by a market, and these are the results you get when you spend decades forcing a square peg into a round hole.
For some reason, these have never caught on here in the US. I don’t know why not. Perhaps the initial cash outlay? Typically US medical insurance plans have a high deductible, so the patient would end up paying for the apparatus. Here it’s much more common for someone who needs supplemental oxygen to get small bottles delivered by a vendor who contracts with your insurer.
Seeing as I use a plain old vented CPAP mask every night and have yet to suffocate, except for that one time I used regular tapwater in the humidifier (Seriously, the chlorine was so bad. I kept dreaming of WWI trenches), I’d say that probably venting the mask would work for extracting exhaled CO2 if the pressurized gas is nitrogen.
Koch’s are to thank for much of this. Look for a good documentary about the Koch’s father. It’s chilling. And disgusting, really, just beyond the pale. Greater enemies of humanity are hard to find.
If it come to a trial, he should plead ‘not guilty’. Not because he did not do it, but because he has no guilt. There is something funny in the way the law works and thinks: you can’t be excused for killing someone because they begged you to do so because of the pain; but this sort of technicality is meat and drink to them.
I am not arguing that psychopaths ought to be let off. But the ‘not guilty’ plea might be enough to argue for reasonable doubt.
Law? What is it good for? Absolutely nothing. Oh hang on, that’s not quite right, is it?
In America, the free market can solve anything. If it can’t, well son, then that’s Communism.
I find it slightly amusing/horrifying that the mask I use has an “anti asphyxiation valve” on it. It makes me wonder how many mishaps had to happen for so many safeguards to be built in.
Tap water is in the humidifier is nasty. I can’t say I ever had chemical warfare dreams when using tap instead of distilled water but it always seems to leave a nasty gunky residue on the bottom of the chamber that is a pain in the ass to clean off.
What a heartbreaking story. I feel like I need a kitten chaser after reading that.
I remember as a youth I thought of Jack Kevorkian as this awful crazy old man that murdered his patients. I didn’t understand the concept of dying with dignity. Now that I’m older and have witnessed first hand some of the horrors of age and progressive diseases, I get it. The fact that voluntary euthanasia is illegal in most of the US is terrible.
Yes, although as @MIndysan33 says, it’s more of a theoretical right. In many parts of the country, if you can get one at all, you can spend years in jail before a public defender is available, at which point they’ll have a few minutes to glance over your case before telling you you’re better off pleading guilty, regardless of your innocence.
So many conservative positions amount to this - being anti-abortion for others (who are getting them for the “wrong reasons”) but want the option for themselves/loved ones, being against “welfare cheats” but needing a social safety net for themselves, against “government interference with health care” but wanting the actual services, etc. - they’re trying to prevent some (largely imaginary) “other” from “abusing” the service/system, so they actively/passively support all sorts of restrictions and conditions on the thing until they actually need it and discover - SHOCK! - it’s not actually there for them anymore.
Some days I feel like “America!” is the punchline to a very sick joke, in exactly the same way “The Aristocrats!” is. This is one of those days.
Nah, not enough debauchery in The Aristocrats.
I’m sorry to hear your story. Indeed a bit shocked, but thankful you shared. Very worth full. May I say condoléances? Because I read, and feel, but not really know what to say? But feel?
Over here, we also don’t have hand guns that easy. (not USA) And I imagine, like you, it’s not damn pretty. I was only talking about people thinking it is/was the only solution /possibility.
