RODNEY HIDE: Death by Government
- Administrator
- Jul 15
- 2 min read
Last year in New Zealand 486 people had their lives ended under the End of Life Choice Act. Of those, 459 received a lethal injection administered directly by an approved medical professional -- not self-administration or an oral drug. A doctor or nurse practitioner delivered the fatal dose.
To be an approved provider requires specific training and registration. There are currently only 121 practitioners on the SCENZ Group (Support and Consultation for End of Life in New Zealand) lists -- roughly one in every thousand qualified doctors and nurses. The full list is not public. Your own GP or nurse may or may not be approved. If you want the service, you can call the national line (0800 223 852 toll free) and be connected to someone who is.
The procedure itself is free. The government pays practitioners up to $3,000 or more per death (including assessments, administration, and travel), depending on the components involved. It is cheaper than palliative or residential care.
Courts in various jurisdictions have ruled lethal injection “cruel and unusual punishment” when used for executions. Some experts consider firing squads more reliable and humane. Yet the public would rightly recoil at the image of a nana being taken from a retirement village and shot. A clinical injection feels cleaner, more clinical.
But is it?
New Zealand’s exact protocol remains secret, but no doubt it closely follows the well-documented Canadian clinician-administered MAiD sequence:
1. Midazolam (benzodiazepine sedative): Induces relaxation, drowsiness, and amnesia to reduce anxiety and awareness.
2. Lidocaine (local anaesthetic): Numbs the injection site for comfort.
3. Propofol (potent anaesthetic): Rapidly produces deep unconsciousness and suppresses breathing.
4. Neuromuscular blocker (e.g., rocuronium): Paralyzes all skeletal muscles, including those used for breathing. No ventilation is provided.
Death follows from respiratory arrest and oxygen deprivation -- technically, suffocation -- usually within minutes. The earlier drugs ensure the patient is unconscious and does not experience or exhibit distress. The final paralysis creates the appearance of a peaceful, serene death.
It is the pharmaceutical equivalent of pushing a pillow over Nana's face and holding her down while she breathes her last. The purpose of the drugs is to prevent her fighting back and jumping about the bed. The process serves to give her every appearance of putting her into a gentle sleep but we need to be clear: she is rendered unconscious, paralysed and then suffocated.
But it is all good. Our Parliament has legislated it. Our Government funds and administers it. Health professionals do the killing. And -- most importantly -- Nana okayed it. It’s not like she can complain.
Rodney Hide is a former Minister and ACT party leader
Our response:
Assisted dying is enabled by one of the few laws resulting from a public referendum. It had majority support. The parliament legislated at the wishes of the people.
Rodney describes the process in barbaric terms. We believe it is barbaric to make people suffer over a protracted period facing a certain death. 306 applicants for euthanasia died while waiting for consent.
Don Brash and Lindsay Mitchell
Never was there a topic to consider long, carefully, and from as many angles as possible.
The roar of disapproval is expected, if one points out the principle that extreme cases make bad law, and that the lived experience of some commenters is …anecdote…
Anecdote with great emotional freight. By the loving survivor. Very powerful.
But the act of dying is individual, nothing in this life more so. Yet some of the respected and weeping survivors can be herded into a stampede to suit the purposes of a deeply Utilitarian, cheapest is best policy. Very convenient to some.
For the sake of your children and your culture I argue you should think twice at least about accepting Administrative Convenience, in…
My late wife died while in a care home suffering from Alzheimers. An entire and large segment of industry for whom the "Right To Life" legislation ignores, on the basis that they they lack cognitave ability and might want to change their mind. She was diagnosed with dementia at least 2 years before she lost the ability to reason and make sound decisions. She, and I would argue that she should have been able to make a living will, at that point, to lay out her wishes for the future. The huge irony is her will, prepared some years earlier, was still valid at the time of her death, an instrument she likely would have made changes to in the…
I accept the referrendum decision even though it was very emotinally biased and there was little consideration of the the possible adverse consequences of this legislation. Predictably, the criteria for being "assisted to die" are and will continue to be more "liberal". There is already consideration of accepting deterioration of one's "quality of life" as justification for "assisted dying". With remuneration of around $3000.00 a go for ending people's lives trying one's best to prolong them becomes economically less appealing that terminating them. There is evidence that most people have difficult times in their lives when dying would be regarded as the solution. It is unlikely that these medical terminations will remain restricted to the sorts of people that voters had such sympathy for. This…
Usually I am with your thinking on issues, Rodney, but not on this one.
Your column is dramatic, but the core analogy collapses the moment you look at it straight on. Smothering Nana with a pillow is violent, conscious, terrifying and non‑consensual. Assisted dying is the exact opposite: Nana is deeply unconscious under anaesthetic, repeatedly consenting, and seeking relief from suffering. If we describe medicine the way Rodney does, then surgery becomes “stabbing someone and rummaging in their guts,” and anaesthesia becomes “drugging people so they can’t fight back.” It’s vivid, sure — but it’s not honest.
The “cruel and unusual punishment” comparison also misses the mark. Those rulings are about botched executions on unwilling prisoners, not medically optimised protocols…
My first response to Rodney is that he clearly has no personal experience in this process.
Sadly, I do.
In 2012 my wife died after 2.5 years of fighting breast cancer. Having tried and exhausted every possible avenue she/we knew it was terminal and to quote her, "we treat our animals better than this". She wanted to end it long before the cancer finally took its own prolonged path but back then there was no legal process she/we could follow.
She was happy to go when she was good and ready which was long before her body finally gave up.
But roll forward 8/9 years and after the legislation came through a neighbour took the plunge as, after 5 years…