Needless end of life suffering in Mexico
24-Oct-14, Human Rights Watch
Tens of thousands of patients with terminal illnesses in Mexico suffer unnecessarily from severe pain and other symptoms because they cannot access adequate end-of-life care, Human Rights Watch said in a report.
The 122-page report, “Care When There Is No Cure: Ensuring the Right to Palliative Care in Mexico,” documents the lack of access for many patients to pain relief and other assistance known as palliative care. Although Mexico’s health law explicitly grants people with terminal illness a right to palliative care, the service is offered almost exclusively at large specialist hospitals.
“People with a terminal illness often experience severe pain and other debilitating symptoms that can make the last weeks of their lives unbearable,” said Diederik Lohman, associate health director at Human Rights Watch. “Mexico should enforce its own law and provide the pain relief and other treatment they need to ease end-of-life suffering.”