- Feb 5, 2002
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Advocates for those with disabilities focused on what they call troubling trends in government-backed assisted suicide programs in the United States and Canada during a panel on the subject held Friday at the 2025 annual conference of the Religion News Association.
Although physician-assisted suicide is still illegal in most parts of the world, the practice is currently legal in about a dozen countries, including Canada, Germany, Spain, and Belgium, along with 10 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.
The phenomenon is causing growing concern for patients’ rights advocates and disability rights advocates who have warned that jurisdictions that allow assisted suicide are failing to provide necessary life-affirming care for vulnerable populations in need of it and are rather encouraging suicide as a cheaper, quicker, and easier option.
According to Matt Vallière, executive director of the Patients Rights Action Fund, U.S. state-level assisted suicide programs are discriminatory against people with life-threatening conditions and are a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Continued below.
Although physician-assisted suicide is still illegal in most parts of the world, the practice is currently legal in about a dozen countries, including Canada, Germany, Spain, and Belgium, along with 10 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.
The phenomenon is causing growing concern for patients’ rights advocates and disability rights advocates who have warned that jurisdictions that allow assisted suicide are failing to provide necessary life-affirming care for vulnerable populations in need of it and are rather encouraging suicide as a cheaper, quicker, and easier option.
According to Matt Vallière, executive director of the Patients Rights Action Fund, U.S. state-level assisted suicide programs are discriminatory against people with life-threatening conditions and are a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Continued below.
Disability rights advocates urge putting the brakes on assisted suicide
Although physician-assisted suicide is still illegal in most parts of the world, the practice is currently legal in about a dozen countries, including 10 U.S. states.
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