A Morbid Development in Belgium
“Capital Punishment” in the hands of a doctor
There has been a 15% increase in medicalized and scheduled deaths according to figures which were recently published in Belgium on February 27, 2024. Once again, proof has been provided that the barriers in ethical matters are being trampled one after another on the Old Continent, with general indifference.
The funeral industry is not a sector that is feeling low in the Kingdom of Belgium: the Federal Control and Evaluation Commission for Euthanasia (FCEE) handed over its results at the end of 2023. The regulatory body recorded 3,423 files of patients who ended their days under the law on assisted suicide. It is figure that has been steadily increasing for years, which now represents 3.1% of all deaths in the country.
48.6% of these euthanasias are carried out at home, 17.4% in a residential care center--compared to 16.4% in 2022--and 32% in a hosptial setting, including in palliative care units.
An American scientific study released in the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management estimates that 25 to 35% more euthanasias than what has been reported.
The vast majority of patients who opted for this mode of self-decided death were 70 years old and older (at 70.7%), while the number of euthanasias among those younger than 40 years old remains for the moment limited, even if one adolescent of 16 years old is among these victims of the 2014 modification of Belgian law, allowing minors to resort to assisted suicide. It is almost no longer taboo.
This process is a profound civilizational change which increasingly dehumanizes human beings and gradually makes the societies involved in it into uninhabitable deserts. This is the price to pay for the rejection of God.
(Sources : VRT-NWS/Zenit/Institut européen de bioéthique - FSSPX.Actualités)
Illustration : Photo 104469820 © Felipe Caparros Cruz | Dreamstime.com
