die" she said "I think that's the way the future will go, putting it rather brutally, you'd be licensing people to put others down." This turns the argument into a worth based on someone's economic value rather than on their true human value and their human dignity. Imagine what will happen in Britain if the proposed laws are implemented. You have a terminal incurable disease. You have the option of palliative care at 1,000 a week or a glass of barbiturates at 5. We all know what will happen once we accept Lady Warnock's proposition that "you're wasting the resources of the National Health Service." Proponents of change say public opinion is with them. But public opinion would probably re-introduce capital punishment and are we to suspend prudent judgement on that question too? And if the question which is asked is "do you want to die in dignity?" , who wouldn't answer yes to that? To die with dignity we don't need doctors to kill us. Macmillan nurses, hospices, and palliative care give the overwhelming majority in Britain a dignified death which does not involve commissioning doctors and nurses as patient killers. Euthanasia represents a terrible defeat. It diminishes the dignity and humanity of the sick and elderly and diminishes those of us who condone it. Care and kill can never and should never be used as synonyms. A change in the law would inevitably carry within it the seeds of its own extension and we stand warned by its