Category: Overseas

The following information about terminology related to the Death with Dignity Act was compiled by the nonprofit Compassion & Choices of Oregon Read article …

QUEBEC — Quebec took a major step toward adopting its law regarding medically assisted death on Thursday when Bill 52 cleared clause-by-clause study by a National Assembly committee. Véronique Hivon, who as junior minister for health and youth protection sponsored the bill, called the bill “a significant advance” and told…

State law provides a fundamental right to a terminally ill, competent patient to choose a physician’s aid in getting prescription medications that will allow a peaceful death, a state judge ruled Monday in a seminal case. Read article …

Back in the mid-70s, we were introduced to the notion of “medical nemesis” by the Austrian philosopher Ivan Illich. He warned us that doctors may do more harm than good, and that some diseases (which he labelled iatrogenic) were caused, not cured, by medical interventions. This doctrine has been widely…

France moves a step closer to legalising assisted suicide after a panel set up by François Hollande recommended the president change the country’s position on euthanasia. Read article …

A physician and nurse practitioner discuss the emerging role of medicals professionals who ease the death process. There is no one right way to die, but just as we need help coming into the world, we need support and love going out of it. Read article …

After his divisive reform of gay marriage and prostitution in France, President Hollande may be about to address yet another controversial topic, as the debate on euthanasia is revived in the country. The suicides of two elderly couples in November and the devastating story of a politician who watched her…

Two doctors and a Santa Fe woman with advanced uterine cancer want physicians in New Mexico to be able to prescribe — without the fear of prosecution— the needed medications for terminally ill patients who want to end their lives on their own terms. Read article …

Hans Kueng, Roman Catholicism’s best known rebel theologian, is considering capping a life of challenges to the Vatican with a final act of dissent – assisted suicide. Kueng, now 85 and suffering from Parkinson’s disease, writes in final volume of his memoirs that people have a right to “surrender” their…

Britain’s most senior judges are preparing to make a landmark ruling over attempts to introduce a ”right to die” under human rights legislation. A full panel of nine Supreme Court Justices, headed by Lord Neuberger, the court’s President, is to be convened next week to hear the culmination of three…

“I think that everyone should have the right to exit as they please.” It’s Richard Dreyfuss, in that unmistakable voice, on the line from New York. An interview about his new film, Cas & Dylan, has led to a discussion about euthanasia – which figures heavily in the movie. Click…

Anyone faced with a life-threatening or chronic illness should be so lucky as Catherine, a 27-year-old waitress in New York. Dr. Diane E. Meier, a palliative care specialist at Mount Sinai Medical Center, recalled her young patient’s story in an article published in 2011 in The Journal of Clinical Oncology.…