Forget pro-life, America is becoming pro-death! Map shows how 29 US states have legalized or are considering euthanasia
A majority of US states have legalized medically assisted suicide or are considering legislation that would do so.
The pro-medical dying movement has seen a groundswell of support since the battle for victories in the 1990s, with most successful initiatives only coming into practice after 2013.
In ten states and Washington, DCeuthanasia is legal, while 19 other states are considering their own legalization measures.
In most states where it is legal, doctors can administer life-ending drugs to someone who has six months or less to live, but the exact criteria varies by state depending on who is in charge there.
Medically assisted suicide has become legal in ten states and Washington, D.C., while 19 other states are considering their own legalization measures
The US population is aging rapidly: by 2040, approximately one in five Americans will be 65 or older. At the same time, more than 170 million Americans could be living with one or more chronic conditions by 2030.
But while many state leaders and health care professionals are advocating assisted dying as a new option for end-of-life care, many physicians argue that the practice goes against the very foundation of their profession.
Efforts in the 1990s to legalize medically assisted suicide failed more often than not, with the exception of Oregon, which in 1997 became the first state to legalize what it calls “death with dignity.”
The authors of the Oregon legislation were careful in writing not to characterize the act as suicide, assisted suicide, mercy killing, or murder, as part of an effort to rebrand and reposition it as a medically sanctioned and regulated procedure.
The term ‘assisted suicide’ and similar terms are now considered outdated by doctors. They choose to call it “medical aid in dying” instead because the patient decides when to take the death-causing medication prescribed by a doctor.
Euthanasia is legal in seven countries – Belgium, Canada, Colombia, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand and Spain – plus several states in Australia
Lynda Bluestein, 76, who urged Vermont to expand medically assisted suicide law to out-of-state residents, died from taking lethal drugs
Eleven years after Oregon passed its law, Washington became the second state to pass a Death with Dignity law through a ballot initiative voted on by residents.
That law was expanded in 2023 to let more health care providers sign medically assisted death requests and allow the drugs to be shipped to patients.
In 2009, medical aid in dying became available in Montana when the state Supreme Court ruled in favor of terminally ill Navy veteran Bob Baxter. Vermont was next to pass its law in 2013, followed by California, which later re-approved it in 2021.
Colorado, DC, Hawaii, Maine, New Jersey and New Mexico followed in 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2021 respectively.
Another 19 states are considering measures to legalize medical aid in dying. In contrast, several others, including Vermont and Oregon, have expanded their laws to allow non-residents to go there to get life-ending drugs from a prescriber.
Among those traveling to Vermont from other states was Lynda Bluestein, a 76-year-old from Connecticut with a terminal cancer diagnosis — who lobbied Vermont to relax restrictions on out-of-state assisted dying.
She traveled to Vermont this month to take her own life, with her husband Paul describing his wife’s final moments as “comfortable and peaceful.”
He said her last words were, “I’m so glad I don’t have to do this (suffer) anymore.”
But even if the practice becomes legal, many doctors may be adamantly against carrying out this practice, saying it contradicts their guideline to do no harm first.
The core ethics statement of the influential American Medical Association has been saying for years: ‘Allowing doctors to provide assisted suicide would ultimately do more harm than good.
“Physician-assisted suicide is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer, would be difficult or impossible to control, and would pose serious social risks.”
The practice has been legal in Canada since 2016 for those whose deaths are “reasonably foreseeable.”
A new law was initially expected to come into effect next month that would make medically assisted death accessible to people suffering from mental illness.
All around 13,200 Canadians chose assisted death in 2022, up 31 percent from 2021, federal health ministers reported.
Of these, 463 were not terminally ill, but had other conditions not mentioned.