Chelsea Roff
@ChelseaRoff
Executive Director of Eat Breathe Thrive, a nonprofit serving people with eating disorders. Engaged in research & policy on risks AD laws pose to our community
People with eating disorders would qualify as terminally ill under this bill, as written. For those who want a quick summary of our research, here are the key points I did not have time to cover today. 🧵👇
Superbly written piece by @ddhitchens, tracing the “right to die” campaign from its troubling origins in the 1970s to its glossy pink rebrand and narrow passage through the Commons on Friday.
Touching the Assisted Suicide Void firstthings.com/touching-the-a… @ddhitchens lifts the dark veil of the assisted suicide polemic. As a palliative care physician, thecritic.co.uk/the-grim-reali… @alexanderchula’s example is all too familiar. The foolishness of MPs leaves me speechless.
"At the risk of sounding like a stuck record" Brilliant and restrained commentary from a senior law professor.
The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill and the NHS 10 Year Plan: mentalcapacitylawandpolicy.org.uk/the-terminally…
This is an exceptional breakdown of the marketing machine and financial force driving the assisted death campaign.
The ‘Assisted Dying Bill’ is on the front page of many newspapers, and at the top of most news websites today. It may feel like it has got to this stage organically, but much of its success is due to an extremely strong marketing campaign from one organisation - Dignity in Dying…
MARKETING ELEMENT 2: BRANDING/VISUAL IDENTITY. Dignity in Dying refreshed their 'visual identity' relatively recently. It is very recognisable, and designed both to enable campaigners to look a little like a 'grassroots' movement, and to appeal to MPs. You can see it in the…
The scenario described here is exactly what happened to @aliciaduncan_xo’s mom who was approved for MAiD on the day she was discharged from a mental health unit, where she’d been admitted following a suicide attempt a few days before. This is not ‘fear-mongering’. This is real.
This is excellent. It’s a must read for anyone who is interested in mental capacity, in the context of assisted dying. @_Chris_Coghlan @Jeremy_Hunt @JakeBenRichards
"Much has been said about raising mental health awareness and de-stigmatising psychiatric illnesses. Yet when the country’s professional body of psychiatrists warned of preventable deaths, legislators did nothing" My article on the #AssistedDyingBill (link in next tweet)
Major unresolved problems with the Leadbeater bill: an A-Z guide. A is for Anorexia. Eating disorder charities and experts have warned that the bill leaves the door open for sufferers to qualify and receive an assisted death: x.com/ChelseaRoff/st…
1/ @vicderbyshire asked a simple question: why did you vote against every amendment eating disorder experts urged you to pass to close the anorexia loophole? A thread on the many eating disorder experts she chose to ignore ⬇️
I've written to @BBCr4today with the hope that the role played by the @UKHouseofLords will be presented more accurately in future programmes. I wonder what @LordSpeaker has to say of this curtailing of the Lords' legitimate constitutional function?
So glad you’re still with us, Samantha.
I suffered with an eating disorder through my teenage years. When I was 15, I spent over a month in hospital refusing to eat. I was on an IV drip, was a dangerously low weight, and my organs were on the brink of failing. If I had the choice to die then, I would have taken it.…
On Friday, 314 MPs voted to redraw the boundaries of medical practice. Many conceded the bill was "imperfect," but backed it anyway. The bill will give some the option of assisted death. But it also removes legal protections for suicidal people. The Lords must now decide…
ASSISTED SUICIDE BILL: "Hundreds of eating disorder experts & charities, family members, doctors, lawyers, people with eating disorders asked them to make straightforward, simple amendments — but that evidence was dismissed" @ChelseaRoff "Disregard for some individual lives"…
“I am left wondering how .… we are still left with an unworkable and unsafe bill” Me too.
🗣️ Unfortunately, I was not given the opportunity to speak during the House of Commons debate on the Assisted Dying Bill last Friday. However, I wanted to share with Shipley constituents, the speech I had intended to deliver👇
CROWDFUNDER: Assisted Death Law races ahead in the UK. Can you help @OtherHalfOrg defend against its harms? We're trying to raise just 0.1% of the amount spent by major campaigners for assisted death over the last decade. Help us 🔗⬇️
There is no convention restricting the Lords on a Private Members’ Bill from the Commons. Ours is a bicameral Parliament and the Lords is constitutionally free to vote, as its conscience pleases, on any Reading. Parliament is ‘Sovereign’, not the Commons.
Exactly the same strategy they used with the High Court judge: push the bill through under the guise of the "strongest safeguards in the world," then strip them out at the first opportunity. The playbook is the same in almost every country that has passed similar laws.
Starts to look like MPs have been played. You thought the safeguards would get stronger - well here’s Lord Steel with a plan to remove the panel in the Lords
The danger of sending a half-baked bill to the Lords is that they may not have time to fix it. "If the bill is not concluded at the end of the parliamentary session, likely to be next May, it would fall." archive.ph/wZII0
The arguments will move on but it will continue to trouble me that the ethics of my profession have profoundly shifted. That we will use NHS resources in endorsing despair & call it a “service”.
.@danny__kruger's efforts to scrutinize the TIA bill were heroic. Time and again, he calmly exposed deep flaws. Time and again, he argued for amendments to strengthen safeguards. Time and again, they were rejected. Whether you have a faith or not, this is a thread worth reading.
I've been accused of disguising something myself - my Christian faith. And it's true that while I've never hidden it (see my maiden speech) I didn't parade my faith as the basis of my objection to assisted suicide. You don't need religious arguments to show this Bill is bad,…
Today @wesstreeting has shared publicly his concerns about yesterday's AD vote. I agree with every word. Each £ of money used to fund dying will be a £ removed from NHS & palliative care - which is already in desperately short supply for terminally ill patients. This is the care…
“We are on your side.” Huge respect to Richard Quigley MP, who came out with his family in the blistering heat today to lend his voice and stand in solidarity with people with eating disorders. @DumpTheScales