Readers Write: End-of-life issues, Dr. Seuss books, Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill

As has Dr. Steve Bergeson ("Aid in dying is not the help sick Minnesotans need," Opinion Exchange, March 3), I have cared for many dying patients and, in addition, serve on a hospital ethics committee where we grapple with the complexities, tension and moral discomfort of end-of-life decisionmaking by patients, families and their medical treatment teams. Medical aid in dying does not undermine the foundational ethical principles of medicine (respect for autonomy, justice, doing good and doing no harm) and the doctor-patient relationship (mutual trust and truth-telling), it simply redirects the focus from doctor-centered to patient-centered care. It forces us, as physicians, to listen to what the patient deems to be dignity and suffering.

I agree with Dr. Bergeson that we need far greater awareness and utilization of hospice and palliative medicine, but not to the exclusion of state authorization of medical aid in dying. Reports from Oregon, Washington, Colorado and other states that have successfully implemented similar laws — some for decades — show that the vast majority of patients who choose medical aid in dying are already enrolled in hospice, and patients enrolled in hospice feel better and live longer. But the two are not at odds. Medical aid in dying is simply one more option for terminally ill individuals who seek to shorten intolerable suffering that may attend an inevitable death from a terminal illness.

We physicians should not impose our religious or moral beliefs on those we serve. Nor should we be expected to act in opposition to our own religious or moral convictions. That is why medical aid in dying is completely optional; that is, no physician, patient, pharmacist, hospital or health care system is required to participate.

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a heightened interest in advance health care planning and the desire to avoid unnecessary suffering at the end of life. Medical aid in dying is one more tool that empowers individuals to die as they have lived, according to their own goals, values and preferences.

I am grateful to state Sen. Chris Eaton and state Rep. Mike Freiberg for sponsoring the End of Life Option Act ("Minnesotans need end-of-life aid," Opinion Exchange, Feb. 24).

In June of 2020, my wife (my best friend) died after our three-and-a-half-year struggle to save her life from pancreatic cancer. By February 2020, it was clear that we had run out of treatment options. She made her wishes known that she wanted to die with dignity at home with her family. By May, she was no longer able to eat many of the foods she loved and the pain required stronger medication. She slept much of the time. She was heroic and did not complain, as I surely would have done. We arranged for hospice care, which because of COVID meant that my daughter and I would provide the direct care and hospice would provide meds and advice. After a week of hospice, pain and eating became more of a problem. In the last two weeks of her life, the pain became more difficult to manage and she became unable to walk and care for herself. At that point, she became convinced that hospice had provided a pill that would end her life. She begged me for that pill. If I had had it, I would have given it to her. On June 23, hospice said that she might live a week longer or more. My daughter and I were heartbroken at the prospect of her continued writhing pain. She died the next day while we held her, and we were grateful for the peace of death.

This kind of death should never, ever be forced on those who do not want it. I can't believe that any sane pet owner would ever treat even a loved animal so poorly. Please support this legislation.

Bergeson, in his counterpoint, seems to suggest that a doctor's sole role is as a healer. I believe every doctor understands that a time will come when healing isn't possible, and they should be willing to honor a patient's clear choice — and patients should be allowed a choice. It should not be about a doctor's discomfort with a patient's choice. A very dear friend of mine availed herself of Washington's aid in dying law after fighting pancreatic cancer for five years. Knowing she had the option allowed her to live those years more fully. Thankfully she'd moved from Minnesota many years ago to a state that trusted her to decide when it was time to go.

The controllers of Dr. Seuss' intellectual property have recently decided to halt publication of six books containing insensitive depictions of people of color, so that they cannot be marketed to impressionable young readers ("6 Dr. Seuss books to stop being published," March 3). The rest of his catalog remains in print, including "Horton Hears A Who," "The Cat in the Hat," "The Lorax" and "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" (a miraculous survivor of both the "war on Christmas" and this alleged "war on Seuss"). Copies of the discontinued books will circulate from vendors, scanned pages will continue to circulate online and not one iota of Seuss' legacy has been erased. Merely, the inheritors of Seuss' legacy have recognized that we don't need to commercialize aspects of a person's legacy that are deleterious to our fellow citizens.

So to reiterate, six of Dr. Seuss' books will no longer be published. But that's not as juicy a talking point as "Dr. Seuss has been canceled."

I see six of Dr. Seuss' books will no longer be published because some of the images are hurtful. Censorship is a slippery slope. I'm still a believer that you should use each as a teachable moment. Perhaps there could be an introduction in each book about racial images and how they are depicted in literature, ads and poetry, and how words and descriptions contribute to hurtful and harmful stereotypes.

I memorized the poem "Somebody's Mother" in high school because the teacher thought the poem highlighted kindness and charity, and that is the viewpoint we discussed in class. What was missing in the discussion was that it is a poem full of stereotypes about the elderly. I did not boycott the poem and instead later in life, as a teacher, I used the poem in a gerontology class to discuss elderly stereotypes. It's also important to discuss the culture at the time. This poem was written in the late 1800s. Read the poem and see what you think.

I'm delighted that work has resumed to replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill with Harriet Tubman. I found Donna Jackson's Feb. 26 commentary ("Tubman was a gun-toting Christian," Opinion Exchange) obsessed with Christian victimhood. For example, she writes that "sadly, our current culture castigates those who claim to trust God." According to a Pew Research poll in 2019, 65% of Americans identify as Christians. That is why Christians are the religious group least castigated for their beliefs.

The hostility that the commentary writer believes liberals have for Christianity is nothing more than our commitment to the establishment clause of the First Amendment. We insist merely that government never prefer one religion over any other.

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