SYRACUSE (TNS) — Earlier this month the state Senate passed the deceptively named Medical Aid in Dying Act, which had passed earlier in the Assembly. It will become law with Gov. Kathy Hochul’s signature.

The name is deceptive because medical “aid” has always been available in the form of medical care for very ill people, including in their dying days. Further, medical “aid” in this bill means a physician provides lethal drug to patients. Aid should take the form of offering tender care and ongoing presence to people as they deal with what dying does entail: loss of capacity, saying goodbye to the things of this world, enduring pain — what is or what will be part of the lives of each and every one of us.

This bill reflects a number of things that are bad for our society:

1. Selfish individualism that puts oneself and one’s own desires above all else, including what is good for society as a whole and how others are affected. Once “what I want” is exalted as the measure, there is no natural stopping point to what will be demanded and allowed.
2. Failure, even unwillingness, to reconcile oneself to one of the most basic realities of life — namely, the inevitability of suffering — along with an unwillingness to assist suffering people to bear their hardship and find meaning in it.
3. Demand to be in total control of what happens to us, including all circumstances of our passing from this life.

But our desire to have what we want, and to exercise control, must be reined in by realism, including recognition of the consequences of our decisions and actions to people in the future, and it must be limited to what is morally right.

Since 2016, a measure with the identical deceptive name (MAiD) has been law in Canada. Now, one death in 25 there (4.1%) is due to MAiD. And the law and groups of people  it covers has been continually extended.

We have been told what is required of us: “Life and death have been set before you, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, that you and your descendants may live.” A warning, therefore: Once we make a covenant with Death, that is what we will get.

(Susan Thomas lives in Syracuse.)