AccessMyLibrary provides FREE access to over 30 million articles from top publications available through your library.

Several Health Care Provider Groups Announce Refusal to Participate: Physician-Assisted Suicide Is Legalized in Washington State.

National Right to Life News

| November 01, 2008 | COPYRIGHT 2008 National Right to Life Committee, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan.  All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)Copyright

By a 5941% margin, Washington became the second state to legalize physician-assisted suicide. The measure, I-1000, was closely modeled after the Oregon law that has been in practice for over 10 years. The new law will take effect in March 2009.

Although there was a broad-based coalition which opposed the measure that included disability rights groups, religious groups, and the Washington State Medical Association, the pro-suicide movement simply had more money and more opportunity to spread its message.

The Seattle-Post Intelligencer reported that I-1000 backers raised $5.5 million, more than 60% from outside Washington, while the Coalition against Assisted Suicide raised merely $1.6 million. With a considerable financial advantage as well as the vocal advocacy of Booth Gardner, a popular former governor, the pro-assisted suicide forces were able to falsely frame the debate around compassion and personal choice.

Once the ballot initiative goes into effect, doctors will be permitted to prescribe a drug dose to a terminally ill patient on request. However, merely because a patient may request the physician assist in their suicide, health care providers are not required to do so.

The Washington State Medical Association, an outspoken opponent of the initiative, has said that "[t]here's no requirement if physicians aren't comfortable with honoring their patients' wishes." Over and above the individual physician's decision not to participate in assisting suicide, there is already a major hospital system taking the step of proactively prohibiting its doctors from participating.

According to Providence Health spokeswoman Karina Jennings, "We believe we don't have to participate and plan to exercise a conscience clause allowing us to be exempt." Providence Health, which is the largest provider of medical care to eastern Washington, operates eight hospitals.

Another organization, Hospice of Spokane, is also choosing not to participate in the law. It has already released a statement saying that its mission is to provide care and support for patients, not hasten their death.

Related articles from newspapers, magazines, journals, and more
COURT EXTENDS ASSISTED-SUICIDE BAN WASHINGTON STATE CONTINUES PROHIBITION WHILE...
Newspaper article from: Rocky Mountain News (Denver, CO) June 11, 1996 700+ words
...letting authorities in Washington state outlaw doctor-assisted suicide while the state challenges...Washington case, doctor-assisted suicide will remain illegal...Appeals was the first such assisted-suicide decision by any federal...
Pro-Euthanasia Group Again Promoting Assisted Suicide in 2008 Washington State...
Magazine article from: National Right to Life News January 1, 2008 700+ words
...leading efforts to legalize physician-assisted suicide in the United States, is targeting...previous efforts to legalize physician-assisted suicide in Washington, including a prior...attempting to re-brand physician-assisted suicide as "physician-assisted death...
Oregon's no longer alone.(Editorials)(Assisted suicide now legal in Washington...
Newspaper article from: The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR) March 7, 2009 700+ words
...the only state with a physician-assisted suicide law. It was a lonely position that...terminal patients. On Thursday, assisted suicide became legal in Washington - the first...consider Oregon's experience with assisted suicide, which was approved by voters in...
Washington State's Assisted Suicide Law In Effect.
Magazine article from: National Right to Life News March 1, 2009 700+ words
As Washington state's physician-assisted suicide law went into effect March 5, pro-lifers urged doctors...system and Group Health Cooperative will participate in assisted suicide, according to the AP. The law, approved by voters...
Court-assisted suicide. (appellate court's ruling on Washington state...
Magazine article from: Commonweal March 22, 1996 700+ words
...s ruling that a Washington law prohibiting physician-assisted suicide was unconstitutional because it violated the Fourteenth...minimal. Evidence from the Netherlands that physician-assisted suicide for the competent and consenting dying patient has led...
Washington state patient dies by assisted suicide.(Canada/World)
Newspaper article from: The Hamilton Spectator (Hamilton, Ontario) May 23, 2009 700+ words
...pancreatic cancer has become the first person to die under a new Washington state law allowing doctors to help terminally ill patients end...to put Fleming in touch with a willing physician. The assisted suicide law requires that at least two doctors certify a patient...
Federal Judge Declares Washington State Law Against Physician- Assisted Suicide...
Newspaper article from: U.S. Newswire May 4, 1994 700+ words
...comment criticizing the recent decision by a federal judge striking down as unconstitutional, a Washington state law against physician assisted suicide -- the first ruling of its kind. Doerflinger is an authority on medical-moral issues, with...
Doctors without borders: Washington state's new physician-assisted suicide...
Magazine article from: Commonweal Callahan, Daniel January 30, 2009 700+ words
By a vote of 59 percent to 41 percent on November 4, 2008, Washington State voters endorsed a ballot initiative to legalize physician-assisted suicide (PAS). If the final outcome was never much in doubt, the margin of victory...
For more facts and information, see all results
©2009 Gale, a part of Cengage Learning. All rights reserved.
About us | FAQs | Contact us | Privacy policy | Terms and conditions
Other Gale sites: Encyclopedia.com | HighBeam Research | Acquire Content | Books & Authors | Goliath | MovieRetriever | Smart QandA