Detroit poll: 61 percent favor right to physician-assisted suicide

They are talking about death -- via physician-assisted suicide.

The three were among 600 Michigan voters polled in a statewide Detroit Free Press survey. The poll found 61 percent would vote for a law that gives adults the right to seek physician-assisted suicide. Also, 53 percent of people in the survey said they would consider assisted suicide for themselves.

The Free Press poll, conducted April 17-23 by EPIC/MRA of Lansing, has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points. The results are consistent with previous polls on the issue.

Supporters of legalized physician-assisted suicide are organizing a petition drive to put it on a statewide ballot, but probably not until 1998.

Brenda Tonne-Hukill, 43, an emergency room nurse from China Township, near Marine City in St. Clair County, said it is an overdue idea.

``A lot of people are kept alive who don't want to be,'' she said. ``I've seen a lot of folks who have no way out. They're trapped, and it's sad.''

``I get a lot of aches and pains, and I've never had any intention of ending my life,'' said Robert Warnaar, 81, of Grand Haven. ``But if I find myself under certain conditions, I wouldn't put that choice out of my mind.''