Letters to the editor, The Daily Advertiser, March 4

I'm running in the Murray electorate as an Independent and fully aware many from Griffith, Leeton and other towns in the electorate read The Daily Advertiser, so I'm happy to answer.

I can only really reflect on my own personal experience. Ten years ago, I had two to three golfball size tumour like growths on my bowel. I was passing blood, constantly vomiting due to septicaemia. I was also in incredible pain for months on end - possibly years prior. Fortunately my surgeon was able to alleviate the problem.

However, had the pain continued and the situation been terminal, I know I would have like the option, although I would not have wanted to use it.

Ten years later, and as I run in this campaign, I have a small jellybean sized brain tumour which was identified five years ago.

It isn't growing and doesn't really impact me.

However, should I become a vegetable in two or three decades' time, again I would like to have the option rather than being trapped inside a conscious, yet lifeless body.

So while I can't speak for others, selfishly I would advocate for the maintenance of the current legislation. I recognise this is a contentious issue.

However, death becomes us all. I don't believe it is something we should fear.

In my view, it is what we do today and what we do for other people that matter.

Not how we choose to manage ourselves in the most adverse of times.

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Many Australians will remember when the Murray River stopped running out to sea some years ago.

Today, of course, the Murray has too much water - one wonders what will nature, turbo charged by human induced climate change, bring on next?

Perhaps in preparation for the future the once mighty Colorado River in the USA can provide some answers as to what not to let happen regarding using the Murray water in future years.

Demand for water from the Colorado River has exceeded supply for the past two decades.

This threatens the water supply for some 40 million people in the USA and the food security of the whole of the USA.

Drastic overuse of water from the Colorado River and climate change are deemed by scientists to be the main causes of what is now a serious shortage of water situation looming in the USA.

The good health of the Murray River is of enormous importance to all Australians.

An in-depth study of how the unstable Colorado water situation has been created in the USA is surely a must-do project for water authorities in Australia to examine.

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