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Only one state, Oregon, has legalized assisted suicide. The Oregon statute, which went into effect in October 1997, provides that a doctor may prescribe, but not administer, a lethal dose of medication to a patient who has less than six months to live. Two doctors must agree that the patient is mentally competent and that the decision was voluntary. As of April 1999, 23 patients were given drugs under the statute, and 15 of them used the drugs to commit suicide. A report released by the Oregon state Health Division reviewing the first year of the law's implementation found that the law was working well and had not been subject to abuse.

I often think that individuals should have the freedom to self prescribe or have access to medication that doctors would prescribe without a prescription. This article from The Washington Post is an excellent reminder or why people should NOT have the freedom to buy dangerous drugs without doctor's consent. It gives examples of how online drug stores run their business using a middle man and a phone doctor to issue the medications. There is a story about one online pharmacy, run by an ex-felon, that went from filling 17 prescriptions in 6 months to over 1100 in a month. The author also mentions stories of indiviuals affected by this problem.

A proposed new law in Arizona would give employers the power to request that women being prescribed birth control pills provide proof that they're using it for non-sexual reasons. And because Arizona's an at-will employment state, that means that bosses critical of their female employees' sex lives could fire them as a result. I like that this article gets down to the nit and grit of what an outlandish claim everyone is making against birth control. This article is explaining how invasive this policy is to allow employers to decide on whether to provide insurance for birth control.

This proposed bill actually says that an employer can ask to see a doctors note saying that the woman is perscribed birth control, but has to be for other reasons than not wanting to get pregnant.

This article talks about the increasingly popular method of self treating ones own illness in the UK. It talks about the side effects and warnings as well as the benefits of treating yourself. There is also information about how the internet helps promote self medicating.