We must do more to save care leavers’ lives | Letters

Readers respond to an article by Dr Zubir Ahmed, who argued that better palliative care should be prioritised before assisted dying is legalised I work as a renal physician, including on a transplant ward, so I will have had many of the same experiences as Zubir Ahmed, but I do not share his opinion about assisted dying (As a doctor, I say this: before we even consider assisted dying, fix how we care for the most vulnerable, 26 August). It is universally agreed that patients with capacity should be able to make decisions about their treatment. Their decision is the one that matters if they have the ability to use and understand the relevant information and can communicate any decision they make. The doctor needs to explain possible options and their likely outcomes in as fair and balanced a manner as possible...

I was told to keep my diagnosis private but I am determined to show the reality of breast cancer and reject the stigma that prevents women seeking treatment ‘Madam, this looks like breast cancer, and if it is, we will chop off your breast.” That was how the doctor welcomed me into the chaotic world of cancer in 2017 when I was 32 years old. He had his back to me, but kept on talking, peering into the specimen bottle. For a moment, I could no longer hear him. I thought of my three children, the university degree I had just bagged and the future I had envisaged. If I was going to die, what was the point of it all? I had invested everything I had to obtain that degree, subjecting my children to days of absence while I spent my nights in the university library...

Campaigners say care users face a postcode lottery for support overseas – despite no extra cost to taxpayer Disabled people are being blocked from travelling abroad by NHS care boards and local councils that refuse to let them use their care funding outside the UK, the Guardian has learned. Campaigners warn of a “postcode lottery” in England where the right of a disabled person to travel overseas depends on where they live or the whim of local officials – even when there is no extra cost to the taxpayer...