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Physician-assisted suicide took the centre of debate in this 1997 broadcast, set against a pending United States Supreme Court ruling on whether individuals have a constitutional right to end their lives with medical assistance. Dr. Max Botticelli, an emeritus professor of medicine at the University of Hawaii serving on Hawaii's Governor's blue ribbon panel on end-of-life issues, expressed general support for the practice, drawing a distinction between physician-assisted suicide and physician-assisted death and arguing that patients should have the right to choose. Sister Roselani Enomoto, director of the Maui County Catholic School Ministry Office and a fellow panel member, argued that the value of human life outweighs any claim to individual autonomy, and called instead for compassionate palliative care including pain management. Professor Cass Sunstein of the University of Chicago Law School outlined the legal landscape, expecting the Court most likely to return the matter to state legislatures rather than establish a constitutional right. Whether Hawaii's government would have to address the legality and conditions of physician-assisted suicide remained the live question the programme put before its audience.
Transcript
Read or download the full transcript (.txt). Speaker labels were assigned automatically and may contain errors.
Companion newspaper commentaries
Commentaries by the guests, published in The Honolulu Advertiser around the broadcast.
