Letter to the Editor: While reading Iestyn Daniel’s letter (Cambrian News, 7 December) under the heading ‘Encourage people to live - not die’, I cannot help but wonder where on earth he got this gross misinformation about the situation in the Netherlands, the country of my birth.

I do have personal experience of terminally ill friends in the Netherlands, including family, who were given the chance to decide at which point their suffering was enough, so they could die peacefully in the presence of those they loved. In every one of these cases this came as a great relief, right up to the final moment.

Now the idea that it is easy to organise assisted dying in the Netherlands and that anyone might be euthanised against their will or even because of ‘a share of the inheritance’, as Mr Daniel claims in his letter, is a complete fallacy.

A GP will not proceed unless he or she had been presented with a signed Living Will long before it became relevant and only after thorough discussions so the GP is fully aware, well ahead, of his or her patient’s precise wishes.

Of course, a GP does have the right to refuse, in which case he/she is obliged to refer the patient to a colleague.

The final safeguard is the involvement of a wholly independent SCEN doctor (Support & Consultation for Euthanasia in the Netherlands) without whose consent a GP would be committing a criminal offence. And for the record: yes, in extremely rare cases a terminally ill child is allowed to die in order to end hopeless and unbearable suffering.

At all times there is close consultation between parents and doctor.

‘Encourage people to live - not die’ proclaims Mr Daniel. Back here: what choice did a close friend of ours have when she broke her hip and could not be operated on because her heart was not strong enough to survive surgery.

She had been suffering from advanced osteoporosis for many years and lived in constant pain long before she broke her hip. When we visited her in hospital some days before her death she was just lying there in complete agony, could not even talk because of the excruciating pain.

She could not be given stronger pain relief for fear that it might kill her in which case the hospital could be held responsible for her death! Not an isolated case of course, so no wonder that, according to opinion polls, more than 90 per cent of the UK’s population believe that assisted dying should be legalised for those suffering from terminal illnesses.

For those who wish to be kept alive under any circumstance, a Living Will is equally important for them as it would set out precisely what they want or don’t want regarding end of life treatment.

But why should their minority view dictate that the majority who think differently are not allowed the choice of what they consider to be a dignified and humane way to die?

Wyck Gerson Lohman,

Llandysul