
Belgian woman, 24, granted euthanasia death over depression - elbigbad
http://m.nydailynews.com/news/world/belgium-woman-24-granted-euthanasia-death-depression-article-1.2276577
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tcj_phx
My girlfriend intended to suicide herself in December 2014. This was a few
months before she met me in March 2015. She's mostly better now.

There are reasons that people feel depressed. American psychiatry does not
treat causes, it experiments with drugs that hopefully help the undesired
symptoms go away. [1]

I wonder what the mental health system is like in Belgium. If it's anything
like the American state-of-the-art, it's ineffective at best.

[1] [https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the-doctor-
isnt-...](https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the-doctor-isnt-in/)

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bret_maverick
In several countries in eastern and western Europe it is pretty much the same
(as the American psychiatry). My brother has been depressed for quite some
time (about 10-ish years) now and has seen psychiatrists in, for example, The
Netherlands. The treatment there was indeed trying out a few different drugs
to see what the effect of these is.

Fortunately, he is steadily (but slowly) improving but not thanks to drugs and
psychiatry(he mostly stopped with any prescription drug 6 months after
starting because it didn't do anything besides numbing numbing him).

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polymeris
That was about 6 months ago. Apparently, she later changed her mind. (I can't
find any good sources, though)

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bunkydoo
When I see things like this, it makes me really think to the root of who we
are as people and how depression plays into our role as human beings. I often
wish it was possible to provide a genetic "vaccine" to depression in early
embryonic stages of human development. If there was some way to encourage
growth of 5-HTT alleles (longer alleles equal less prone to depression) we
could see people born seemingly "immune" to this state of being.

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dineshp2
It seems a little strange that the woman can decide weather to end her life
somewhat unilaterally.

Giving such power to her when she is in depression is dangerous to say the
least. The _what if she recovers_ question remains.

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rawTruthHurts
The what if she doesn't recover question would have been laying around too.

The woman that can decide weather:
[http://comicsalliance.com/files/2015/08/storm-
feat-630x420.j...](http://comicsalliance.com/files/2015/08/storm-
feat-630x420.jpg)

~~~
conceit
Decide weather, really? Really? A comic reference, are you serious? I mean,
this is kind of a serious topic so your comment would seem inappropriate, but
I appreciate the helpfulness towards language learners. It's just the person
making the mistake would not even get the joke if they don't know it's
supposed to be spelled 'whether'.

Seems ridiculous anyhow that anyone would seek permission for suicide. If
somebody is so dependent, allowing it is obviously grossly negligent. If _she
doesn 't recover_, her death is a problem that will eventually solve it self,
it just takes patience.

~~~
rawTruthHurts
Take it easy, I made my point in the first line.

