George Washington Couldn’t Lie and Rick Santorum Can’t Tell the Truth
Earlier this month, Santorum joined fellow far right doozie, James Dobson and brought up the subject of euthanasia at the American Heartland Forum. “They have voluntary euthanasia in the Netherlands, but half the people who are euthanized every year, and it’s 10 percent of all deaths, half of those people are euthanized involuntarily in hospitals, because they are older and sick,” Santorum said. “So elderly people in the Netherlands don’t go to the hospital. They go to another country. Because they’re afraid because of budget purposes they will not come out of that hospital if they go in with sickness.” He said many elderly Dutch wear bracelets saying “Don’t euthanize me.”
A little truth-seeking, Maestro…
Let’s see where Santorum got the core accusation of his Euthansia ramblings…that half of the hospital euthanizations were ‘involutary’. The origins of that estimate appear to come from a 1997 Internet article at answersingenesis.org. This group defines themselves as ‘apologetics or Christianity defenders. They claim that in all matters, the bible is the only reference worth considering, especially when it comes to creation and evolution. Here is the paragraph from the ‘answers in Genesis’ site that Santorum or one of his staffers apparently stumbled upon:
What are the consequences of accepting euthanasia? According to a Dutch study investigating the effects in Holland, where euthanasia is tolerated while not strictly legal (legalization didn’t come along until 2002) it was found that in a single year there were more than 2,700 reported euthanasia deaths. Over 50% of these were involuntary, i.e. the patient was not given a choice.”