Headline, March 10 2025/ ESSAY : ''' DEATH & DEALS '''

ESSAY : 

''' DEATH & DEALS '''

'' THE INK OF THE STUDENTS '' : ESTEEMED FOUNDER TELECOM engineer from a top university, Haleema Zia, lost her precious mother very early to Breast Cancer. From the heavens above, she watches her great daughter : !WOW!'s ROCK!

'' DEATH is never to be feared unduly. The only earthly certainty in life is death. And the lesson for all - that I have narrated above is - that mankind, all students must stay very conscious of the time allotted to mortals.'' '' Great things must be attempted. And only great things done.''

IN the real modern and present world : '' In negotiation with death '' many doctors won't honour dementia patients' requests to die even when it is legal. In Castricum, The Netherlands, soon Irene Mekel will need to pick the day she dies.

She's not in any hurry : She quite likes her life, in a trim, airy house by the sea. She has flowers growing in her back garden, and there is a street market nearby where vendors greet villagers by name.

But if her life is going to end the way she wants, she will have to pick a date, sooner than she might like.

'' It's a tragedy,'' she said.

Ms. Mekel, 82, has Alzheimer's disease, It was diagnosed a year ago. She knows her cognitive function is slowly declining, and she knows what is coming. She spent years working as a nurse, and she cared for her sister, who had vascular dementia.

For now, she is managing, with help from her three children and a big street in the corner of the living room that they update remotely to remind her of the date and any appointments.

In the not-so-distant future, it will no longer be safe for her to stay at home alone. She had a bad fall and broke her elbow in August. She does not feel she can live with her children, who are busy with careers and children of their own.

She is determined that she will never move to a nursing home, which she considers an intolerable loss of dignity. As a Dutch citizen, she is entitled by law to request that a doctor help her end her life when she reaches a point of unbearable suffering. And so she has applied for a medically assisted death.

In 2023, shortly before her diagnosis, Ms. Mekel joined a workshop organised by the Dutch Association for Voluntary End of Life. 

There, she learned how to draft an advance request document that would lay out her wishes, including the conditions under which she would request what is called euthanasia in the Netherlands.

She decided it would be when she could not recognize her children and grandchildren, hold a conversation or live in her own home.

But when Ms. Mekel's family doctor read the advance directive, she said that while she supported euthanasia, she could not provide it. She will not do it for someone who has by definition lost the capacity to consent.

A rapidly growing number of countries around the world, from Ecuador to Germany, are legalizing medical assistance in dying. But in most of these countries, the procedure is available only to people with terminal illness.

The Netherlands is one of just four countries [ plus the Canadian province of Quebec ] that permit medically assisted death by advance request for people with dementia.

But the idea is gaining support in other countries, as populations age and medical interventions mean more people live long enough to experience cognitive decline.

The Dutch public strongly supports the right to an assisted death for people with dementia. Yet most Dutch doctors refuse to provide it.

They find that the moral burden of ending the life of someone who no longer has the cognitive capacity to confirm their wishes is too weighty to bear.

Ms. Mekel's doctor referred her to the Euthanasia Expertise Center in The Hague, an organisation that trains doctors and nurses to provide euthanasia within the parameters of Dutch law and connects patients with a medical team that will investigate a request and provide assisted death to eligible patients in cases where their own doctors won't.

But even these doctors are reluctant to act after a person has lost mental capacity. 

'' The harrowing aspect of this whole thing is looking for the right time for the horrible thing. ''

This Subject Publishing continues into the future. The World Students Society thanks Stephanie Nolen.

With the most respectful and loving dedication to Mankind, all the parents of the world, senior aging citizens, Global Founder Framers of !WOW!, and then Students, Professors and Teachers of the world.

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