The campaign for assisted suicide in Scotland has been gathering momentum over the last few months. Dignity in Dying, formerly known as the Voluntary Euthanasia Society, has recruited high-profile figures such as the TV personality Prue Leith to front its campaigns. She is personally invested in the issue. Her brother David died of bone cancer, a particularly rare and painful form of the disease.
Prue Leith deserves our sympathy because it is terrible to see a loved one suffer a terminal illness, racked with pain and losing hope. However, legislating for “assisted dying” is not straightforward. It raises deep ethical questions about the status and value of the vulnerable and terminally ill, as well as wider questions about the kind of society we want to
