Two states, Oregon and Washington, have legalized physician-assisted suicide through voter-approved ballot initiatives. Massachusetts will become the third if voters approve the so-called Death With Dignity ballot question. The measure would let terminally ill patients with six months or less to live get a lethal prescription. The outcome of that vote could change the landscape for legalized suicide nationwide.
When Dr. Marcia Angell was editor of the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine back in the 1990s, she startled many of her colleagues by arguing that dying patients should have a legal right to kill themselves. She took that stance partly because of what her father did when he was in severe pain from prostate cancer.
"He took a pistol from his bedside table, where he had kept it all of my life. He took it out that night and he shot himself and died instantly," Angell says.
She believes her father wouldn't have resorted to a bullet if he could have had a fatal medication by his bedside.
"If it was something that was legal and accepted, I think he would have lived longer and I think it would have been much easier for the family," Angell says.
Terminally ill Massachusetts adults will have that option if Question 2 on the state ballot becomes law. Angell and the ACLU are primary backers. She says the term physician-assisted suicide is a misnomer.
"It is not a choice between life and death. It's a choice of the exact timing and the manner of death because these patients are dying," Angell says.
Disabilities rights activist John Kelly is ardently against the measure, as are the Massachusetts Medical Society and several religious organizations.
"My major concern is that this bill is a recipe for abuse," Kelly says.
The two sides disagree on whether the initiative has adequate safeguards. Kelly fears that sick people with treatable depression could feel pressure to end their lives from family members eager for an inheritance or because they feel like a burden.
"Here I think about people with psychiatric histories, people with dementia, people who are subject to coercion. These people will be impacted," he says.
Remembrances
Assisted Suicide Advocate Uses Law To End His Life