Euthanasia Pushes Belgium Into Abyss as Numbers Rise

Bioethics   |   Wesley J. Smith   |   Aug 25, 2011   |   5:17PM   |   Brussels, Belgium

The Netherlands used to be the heart of euthanasia darkness.  It is still dark, but the culture of death crown has passed to Belgium, which not only legalized doctor-injected killing, but has enthusiastically embraced euthanasia’s logical corollaries. 

And now, we find that the number of euthanasia killings continues to rise exponentially. From the story:

“Growing trend for euthanasia,” headlines the front page of Le Soir. ”Since 2002, and the implementation of a law that partially depenalises the practice, there have never been more cases of euthanasia,” explains the Belgian daily, which reports on the latest figures from the federal monitoring agency. With more than 85 declared cases per month since the start of this year, there will be more than 1,000 deaths by euthanasia in 2011, as opposed to 954 in 2010.

As a comparison, in 2008, there were about 500 cases, meaning a 100% increase in just 3 years.

Not only that, but as I have reported here, Belgium euthanasia as resulted in:

Euthanasia is becoming a way of “life” in Belgium.  As a consequence, the country is in a moral free fall. Culture of death, Wesley?  What culture of death?

LifeNews.com Note: Wesley J. Smith, J.D., is a special consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture. Excerpted from his A Rat Is a Pig Is a Dog Is a Boy: The Human Cost of the Animal Rights Movement (Encounter, 2010). This post originally appeared at First Things, the location of his blog Secondhand Smoke.