Page 23 - SPRING 2024 News and Views

A young friend of mine has mouth cancer; he has lost his tongue and can no longer eat or speak and he
grows weaker by the day. Over the years that I have
known him we have shared a love of growing
orchids and I send messages to him regularly,
together with a photo of one of his favourite
orchids when I find a new one to share. Although
he is seriously ill, I know that he does not want his
life to be ended whilst his pain is under control, yet
the option should be there if and when he can take
no more.

If an Assisted Dying Bill is eventually passed by the
UK Parliament, I doubt that patients would be
queuing at the doors to ask for their lives to be ended. The will to live is very strong in most of us, despite
suffering from some truly dreadful health conditions. I meet and speak to many patients in the cancer
ward, as well as online, and I know of very few who would request assisted dying at their stage of illness.
Recent proposals suggest that it is only in the last six months of a terminal condition that the right to an
assisted death should be agreed. Many suggest that such restrictions are unnecessary given the wide
range of serious health conditions and circumstances, but it would be a start.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Climate Change Submitted by Peter Estall

Christi Proistosesco, a professor of climate dynamics at the University of Illinois, suggested a more
forward looking way to conceptualize this warming trend. After posting a graph of rising global
temperatures, he tweeted, ‘Just wanna make sure everyone understands what we’re looking at here:
Don’t think of it as a warmest month of August in the last century. Think of it as one of the coolest
months of August in the next century’

Christi Proistosesco, @christiproist, Twitter, September 10, 2020

Quoted in
Vaillant, John ( 2023 ) Fire Weather; A True Story From a Hotter World Sceptre

23