Born to reign over us – or perhaps not

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/sep/07/born-to-reign-over-us-or-perhaps-not

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I recently returned from supporting our friend Bob Cole who died in Zurich, as he wished, at a time of his own choosing (Report, 15 August). He had only a few months to live and we had cared for him as he spent each day in excruciating pain, often curled up on the bed trying not to scream. No matter how many drugs he took, the pain was too much. Why would anyone want people to suffer like this? The assisted dying bill is about allowing people with a terminal illness to end their life, it’s about choice – for patients and doctors. Bob was brave enough to allow his story to be told through the media; he wanted people to have what he didn’t have – the choice to die at home, as and when he wanted. And it seems most people in this country want the same.Carol TaylorMatlock, Derbyshire

• Can I remind you of Alexander Chancellor’s Guardian article “History should be harsh on Tony Blair for embracing Gaddafi” (25 February 2011) and hope that some reference is made to this theme when your paper evaluates Blair’s contributions to current debates. You might lead historians to consider how Blair’s Gaddafi hug changed the flow of events to our current Middle East/North Africa disaster.Vernon WhiteConstantine, Cornwall

• Dennis Hawkins (Letters, 7 September) can be reassured that although the present Queen’s reign has included 16 leap years and Queen Victoria’s only 15 (1900 not having been a leap year), this was taken into account in calculating the date at which the Queen’s reign equals that of her great-great-grandmother, at 23,226 days and about 16 hours. (There is some uncertainty about the exact times of both Queens’ accessions, as their respective predecessors both died in their sleep.)Tim LidbetterKingston upon Thames

• One key item was omitted from the comparison of queens Victoria and Elizabeth II (Who is UK’s queen of queens?, 5 September). According to Queen Victoria’s Gene: Haemophilia and the Royal Family (D and W Potts) Queen Victoria was almost certainly illegitimate.Clive CollinsMartlesham Heath, Suffolk

• “Mediterranean diet ‘as good … as statins’ ” (7 September). Would that be a Greek coffee and cigarette for breakfast and chips with everything?Chris HardyLondon