Killing thousands could save NHS millions, Govt estimates

Funding the deaths of thousands by assisted suicide could save the NHS millions of pounds, an impact assessment has predicted.

A Government appraisal of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill estimates that within ten years of it coming into effect, there will be between 1,042 to 4,559 assisted suicides in England and Wales, saving the NHS up to £59.6m per year in “unutilised healthcare”.

In its current form, Kim Leadbeater’s controversial Bill would allow patients deemed to be terminally ill and with less than six months to live, to receive help to kill themselves. MPs are set to debate her proposals again on 16 May, and the Bill could face its final vote in the House of Commons on the same day.

‘Unutilised care

The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC)-led assessment reasoned that if the “process takes 2 months from preliminary discussion to assisted death, and that the individual would otherwise have lived for 6 months, then there would be up to 4 months of unutilised care”.

It reported that estimated savings of between £5.84m to £59.6m by year ten would come from a reduction in ambulance costs, A&E visits, hospital stays, outpatient visits, GP appointments, and home visits, out-of-hours care, hospice costs and money spent on medication.

The DHSC acknowledged that “some terminally ill adults in the final 6 months of life may have greater palliative care needs than others. The costs may therefore be an underestimate”.

Other savings, the report concluded, could be expected in the social care sector and in social security payments – including pensions and benefits.

Failings

Responding to the figures, The Christian Institute’s Director Ciarán Kelly said: “Under Leadbeater’s awful Bill, money will be diverted from care into killing.

“If the many hours wasted on debating assisted suicide had been spent on debating how to improve palliative care, we’d be in a much better position, offering people life and hope instead of death and despair.”

Professor Louis Appleby, who chairs the National Suicide Prevention Strategy Advisory Group, warned: “Stripped of moral values, set out in economic terms (inc savings on terminal care), costing ‘approved substance’ to the penny, a necessary reminder of where we are heading.”

And former Paralympian Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson observed: “This assessment highlights how assisted dying would put disabled and other vulnerable people at grave risk by providing financial incentives to an already overburdened and under-resourced NHS to offer assisted dying as a ‘treatment option’.”

Legal challenge

Tom Cross KC recently stated that Leadbeater’s assisted suicide Bill discriminates against people with certain disabilities and could be challenged under the European Convention on Human Rights (EHCR)

Mr Cross and fellow barrister Ruth Kennedy explained that the Bill contained “no adequate safeguard protecting the position of those with disabilities where suicidal ideation is more likely, and who are, because of that feature of their disability, more likely to express a clear and settled wish to die”.

They stated: “In our opinion, this failure to treat these different cases differently in the enjoyment of the right to life is in breach of the ECHR.”