Assisted Death

Although analysis of prehistoric violence no longer views the lives of early individuals and groups as a simple binary between total peace or outright war, recent studies often continue to overlook the behaviors that might be regarded as the antithesis of violence; the provision of care. Additionally, certain applications of the bioarchaeology of care have cited a lack of evidence of violence as evidence of care in the form of protection from harm, further emphasizing the division between violence and care. The results of the recent application of an altered bioarchaeology of care approach to the entire Archaic Period component of a prehistoric Native American cemetery population from North Alabama have revealed that care and violence should not be analyzed and interpreted separately. Multiple individuals from this study, despite demonstrating similarities relating to the presence of antemortem and perimortem violent injury, were proven to be different only through the incorporation of the results of this care analysis into final interpretations. 
In particular, it was only through this simultaneous analysis of violence and care, at the individual and population level, that this study was able to identify the earliest archaeological case of an argued “mercy killing” in the Southeast, a practice which is well documented ethnohistorically. This suggests that perimortem violence in the past might not simply be proof of violent attack or warfare, and it is argued that future applications of this simultaneous considering violence and care within past groups could lend new insight into human behavior and the development of social complexity through time and space.

This study applied the bioarchaeology of care methodology to the entire available Archaic period component of 1Ct27 a site in North Alabama to explore possible trends in care. A combination of skeletal, artefactual, mortuary, and ethnohistorical analysis revealed several interesting trends in survival, suggesting a possible link between care and violence and that the decision to provide care was likely linked to complex factors of individual and group identity. These results provide valuable insight into the treatment of disabled individuals in the past, and suggests that this method has high potential value for additional studies within the Southeastern US.

Over two decades of Dutch experience with voluntary assisted dying can inform deliberations about the nature of a regulatory framework in Australian jurisdictions.

This article considers three issues from this perspective:

1. Whether the Government permit required in Victoria prior to providing voluntary assisted dying is defensible

2. Whether the Victorian preference for self-administration over practitioner administration is sound

3. The need for transparency about how voluntary assisted dying systems operate including research.

ABSTRACT
This report on end-of-life decision-making in Canada was produced by an international expert panel and commissioned by the Royal Society of Canada. It consists of five chapters.
Chapter 1 reviews what is known about end-of-life care and opinions about assisted dying in Canada.
Chapter 2 reviews the legal status quo in Canada with regard to various forms of assisted death.
Chapter 3 reviews ethical issues pertaining to assisted death. The analysis is grounded in core values central to Canada’s constitutional order.
Chapter 4 reviews the experiences had in a number of jurisdictions that have decriminalized or recently reviewed assisted dying in some shape or form.
Chapter 5 provides recommendations with regard to the provision of palliative care in Canada, as well as recommendations for reform with respect to the various forms of assisted death covered in this document.