In defending his participation in the suicides of some 41 people, Dr. Jack Kevorkian has asked his critics to consider the quality of life for high quads living on ventilators. Mark O'Brien offers his own evaluation as a quadriplegic who spends all but one or two hours a week in an iron lung. O'Brien is a poet and freelance writer living in Berkeley, Ca.

BERKELEY-- There's a killer on the loose. He doesn't kill boys as John Wayne Gacy did. That would get him into trouble. He doesn't kill women as Ted Bundy did. That would get him into trouble. He kills disabled people.

Perhaps it's appropriate that killers specialize these days. Healers have been specializing for years. And by limiting his killing to disabled people, Dr. Jack Kevorkian stays out of jail. If he'd chosen another specialty, it is likely he would now be residing in one of the less comfortable places in the Michigan correctional system. He might even be dead.

Dr. Kevorkian has said, "Let my critics consider the quality of life of a high quad who's dependent on a ventilator." I am such a high quad, high quad being medical jargon for a person who has suffered an injury high up on the spinal cord. As a high quad, I cannot move my arms or legs, hands or feet. This is so with most high quads. I need a ventilator, that is, a respirator, to help me breathe. I ask you to consider the quality of my life.

I live in a pleasant new apartment in Berkeley, California, one of the most interesting small cities in the world. I write articles for newspapers and magazines, and commentaries for radio. My poetry has been published. I have tons of books, an alarming collection of cassettes and CD's, a girlfriend, a web site, a documentary film about me and a proclamation from the city of Berkeley declaring Mark O'Brien day. Who could ask for anything more?

Now I ask you to consider Dr. Kevorkian's quality of life. His main interest, nay, his obsession, is killing disabled people or people who say they are disabled. This mostly cashes out to mean depressed middle-aged women. They come to Dr. Kevorkian seeking release through death. Occasionally, Dr. Kevorkian is put on trial for murder. This gives him a chance to pose as the humane martyr to the laws passed by insensitive politicians. He has never been convicted. The jurors say afterwards, O yes, they would rather be dead than be, horrible shudder, confined to a wheelchair.

Well, how do they know?

Have they ever been disabled? Have they ever had a serious discussion with a disabled person? Has the prosecution had the sense to call a disabled person to the witness stand to testify that many factors beside medical condition affect a person's quality of life?

The answers to these questions are no, no and no. The most likely source of the jurors' wisdom is the memory of their parents' hushed talk of Uncle Mitch who was shot up in the war.

Dr. Kevorkian's quality of life doesn't sound so hot to me. A serial killer who has the intelligence to pick on a despised minority doesn't sound like he has much to live for. I would be tempted to help Dr. Kevorkian put an end to his existence, but I don't believe in telling other people what they want. I don't believe in killing people, not even serial killers. I don't believe that death is the best solution to the problems of life.

I am part of a national organization called Not Dead Yet. Not Dead Yet opposes the killing of disabled people that is being advocated not only by Dr. Kevorkian, but by the slick breed of insurance industry subsidized thinkers who call themselves bioethicists. They say some people, usually the poor, elderly and disabled, must be sacrificed to keep medical costs low.

Not Dead Yet says we must all be equal in the eyes of the law, that murder for the sake of lower operating costs is not the American way, that no one can speak for us, the disabled people of America, except ourselves. Just as we do not presume to know the best interests of those contemplating suicide, Dr. Kevorkian should not presume to know ours -- let alone to use others' desperate acts as proof that we would be better off dead than alive.