Dying with Dignity Tasmania has praised the Governor of California, Jerry Brown, for signing their new assisted dying law and expressing his compassion and understanding of the needs of people with prolonged, intolerable suffering. The End of Life Option Act passed both houses of the Californian Parliament in September, but could have been vetoed by the Governor.
According to reports, Governor Brown, a Catholic and former Jesuit seminarian, consulted a Catholic Bishop and two of his own doctors before making his decision to endorse the law. He is reported as stating the crux of the matter for him was whether the state of California should continue to make it a crime for a dying person to end his life no matter how great his pain and suffering. In his statement to legislators, he said: “I do not know what I would do if I were dying in prolonged and excruciating pain. I am certain, however, that it would be a comfort to be able to consider the options afforded by this bill”.
He also said he would not deny that comfort to others.
Dying with Dignity Tasmania has thanked Lara Giddings for her continued commitment to a new voluntary assisted dying Bill and Cassy O’Connor who will co-sponsor it. The President, Margaret Sing, said she hoped a Liberal co-sponsor would also come forward and urged Tasmanian members of Parliament to follow Governor Brown’s compassionate lead and support a new Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill when it is moved. “We agree with him it should not be a crime for doctors to assist patients to end their intolerable and unrelievable suffering through drugs that will end their lives peacefully, when doctors and patients know they’re never going to get any better and there are no other options to end that suffering,” Ms Sing said. “Only a few people will need this assistance but a voluntary assisted dying law will provide comfort to many more of us to know there could be an option if we are faced with terrible suffering at the end of our lives”.
She also said that the new law is particularly significant because California is the most populous US State with a population of 38 million and several similar proposals and Bills have been rejected in the past.
California has become the fifth US State where it will be legal for doctors to prescribe lethal drugs for terminally ill people with less than six months to live and have made a voluntary, competent and informed decision.
Supporting information
1. With the signing of the Californian End of Life Option Act, there will be 11 jurisdictions where voluntary assisted dying is legal:
Switzerland (1942 Criminal Code)
US States – Oregon (1997), Washington (2009), Vermont (2013), Montana through a court decision and California (2015). A New Mexico court appeal for legal assisted dying is underway.
Europe: The Netherlands (2002), Belgium (2002) and Luxembourg (2009)
Canada: Quebec Province (2014). Action is also underway to implement a decision in February 2015 by the Canadian Supreme Court that prohibition of assisted dying is unconstitutional and the court supported “physician-assisted death for a competent adult person who (1) clearly consents to the termination of life and (2) has a grievous and irremediable medical condition (including an illness, disease or disability) that causes enduring suffering that is intolerable to the individual in the circumstances of his or her condition”.
Columbia, South America, through court decisions.
2. There are two key differences between the legal provisions:
In US States, the requirement is that people accessing assisted dying must be terminally ill with 6 months or less to live. In Quebec, people have to be “at the end of life” (undefined). Elsewhere it is not, and has never been, a requirement for people to be terminally ill because the focus is on unbearable and unrelievable suffering due to an incurable and irreversible medical condition.
In Switzerland and US States, people have to take the final act to self-administer the lethal drugs (eg by swallowing them or opening the valve of a drip) and doctors are prohibited from administering them (eg by injection). Elsewhere self-administration and doctor-administration are legal.
www.dwdtas.org.au
