BAD MEDICINE FOR DOCTORS

Orange County's six representatives should vote against House Resolution
4006, the Lethal Drug Abuse Prevention Act of 1998, sponsored by Rep. Henry
Hyde of Illinois. We wrote about H.R. 4006 a month ago, but it's scheduled
for a House vote next week.

H.R. 4006 is a response to an Oregon law allowing doctor-assisted suicide.
H.R. 4006 would yank a physician's federal license to prescribe drugs if he
or she "intentionally dispensed or distributed a controlled substance with
a purpose of causing or assisting in causing" suicide. And the bill would
set up yet another unneeded federal bureaucracy,a Medical Review Board on
Pain Relief,to investigate doctors.

Dr. Harry Rose, M.D., of Carmichael,a leader in the adequate pain relief
cause,told us the bill would "make any doctor who has a terminally ill or
chronically ill patient under-prescribe to prevent somebody[in
government]looking to see if the doctor gave too much so the patient did
himself in." He says that suicides often happen precisely because patients
are "under-prescribed" pain killers and try to seek relief by any means.

Checked-by: Pat Dolan