COLIN CAMPBELL: An absurd argument from the opponents of assisted dying

It is of course necessary for those who support assisted dying to respect the views of those who oppose it.

There is nothing to be gained by turning the debate - which this year moves on to a vote in the Scottish Parliament - into a rancorous shouting match. Even so, respect for the arguments of some opponents may begin to fray.

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This applies to claims, in particular advanced by senior MP Diane Abbott and others, that hospitalised patients may feel coerced into ending their lives because they don't want to be "a burden on the NHS".

Ms Abbott, who enjoys the parliamentary title of "Mother of the House", observed in her opposition to assisted dying: "Consider the elderly widow who has been hospitalised, and worries she is taking up a valuable bed in an NHS under significant strain, and would be better off dead."

I've known a few elderly widows over the years - one of them being my mother - and each and every one has been made of much sterner stuff than those Diane Abbott and others who advance this incredibly frail argument seem to be acquainted with.

Those of us who are at a fairly advanced age are liable to take much more interest in the assisted dying issue than younger people, who are, quite rightly, too wrapped up in their working lives to give any serious thought to departing this Earth. We are also likely to have had more experience with people who have had lengthy spells in hospitals. In my case that applies to several elderly relatives in our extended family over the years, and my mother, who was in hospital for several months in her final year, at the grand old age of 90.

There have been many bedside visits, with conversations ranging from bedsores to boredom and the more upbeat aspects of recovery.

But never once did I hear anyone I visited express the view that they were afflicted by unease, concern or anxiety over the burden they were imposing on the NHS. And in multiple conversations with relatives of others in hospital no one has ever said to me: "He/she is really worried about hogging a hospital bed for too long."

Has anyone ever heard such a refrain, from anyone?

A hospital bed is a place far removed from the normal world. And while in one a patient is fully justified in thinking only of themselves. Not about family travails, not about any difficulties affecting friends, not about bills or any other mundane aspects of life - only about your own health and wellbeing. And even though you're slap bang in the middle of it - certainly not about the burdens on the NHS. You are ill, you are sick, and precisely for that reason you are excused that particular concern.

Those who support assisted dying tend to have a clear and uncomplicated view of how and where it should be an option.

Some at least who oppose assisted dying have been determined to drag in maximum confusion and complexity, with "coercion" being the driving force behind their argument. As they see it, there are apparently so many callous souls out there desperate to get their hands on money and assets and so eager to persuade older family members to have a conveniently early death. There are certainly some wicked people in the world and this could happen but as a risk factor I believe it has been greatly exaggerated. How many people can actually think of someone they know who'd be capable of such evil behaviour?

And what's to be said of the claim that a person could somehow be "coerced" into opting for an early grave to avoid inconveniencing the NHS? That's one absurd fallacy that should be laid to rest long before this debate ever reaches the Scottish Parliament.

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