- Switzerland – Switzerland legalized assisted dying in 1942 on the condition that the motive not be selfish, making it the first country in the world to permit the practice. Doctors can prescribe medicines and give them away or keep them with you to take yourself. Many Swiss organizations, such as Dignitas, provide their services to foreign citizens.
- United States of America – Medical assistance in dying, also known as physician-assisted dying, is legal in 10 states: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Montana, Maine, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington, as well as the District of Columbia. District. Oregon was the first state to legalize it under a law that took effect in 1997. It allows mentally competent patients who are terminally ill and have less than six months to live to ask for life-ending medication. People from outside Oregon can travel to the state to take advantage of the law.
- Netherlands – The “Termination of Life on Request and Assisted Suicide (Review Process) Act” came into force in 2002. A doctor has been spared punishment for euthanasia and assisted suicide where patients are experiencing “unbearable suffering with no prospect of improvement”. Minors can request euthanasia from the age of 12 but require parental permission before the age of 16.
- belgium – Belgium legalized medically assisted dying in 2002 for terminally ill people and those experiencing unbearable suffering, including patients with psychiatric conditions. Since 2014, people under the age of 18 who are terminally ill are covered by the law, as long as they have parental permission.
- Canada – Canada introduced “medical assistance in dying” in 2016 for people whose death was considered “reasonably foreseeable”. Five years later, the law was expanded to allow people with “serious and irreparable” medical conditions to request an assisted death. The country has delayed to 2027 a plan to expand medical aid in the dying to include people suffering from mental illness.
- Australia – Voluntary assisted dying for people who are terminally ill or have a condition causing unbearable suffering is legal in most Australian states, after first being introduced in Victoria in 2019. Doctors may prescribe medications for self-administration or administer them where necessary.
- spain – Spain approved a law in 2021 that allows euthanasia and medically assisted suicide for people suffering from incurable or debilitating diseases who wish to end their lives.
- Germany – Assisted dying was legal in Germany until 2015, when the country outlawed its provision on an organized or commercial basis, and in many cases effectively banned it. Five years later, the nation’s top court ruled in favor of groups providing assisted suicide services to terminally ill adults, but lawmakers have yet to finalize new rules.
- France – Doctors in France have been allowed since 2016 to administer deep anesthesia to a person who is near death and in extreme pain, but not to administer life-ending medication. President Emmanuel Macron earlier this year backed new legislation that would allow assisted dying for people with terminal conditions and introduced a bill in April, but polls in June and July slowed progress on the proposed law. Interrupted.
- Britain – A bill to give terminally ill adults who have six months or less to live the right to end their lives was introduced into Parliament in early October and will be debated on November 29.
- ireland – A cross-party Irish parliamentary committee recommended this year that the government should legalize assisted dying in certain restricted circumstances. In October a majority of MPs voted in favor of “noting” the committee’s findings. With national elections scheduled for November 29, it will be up to the next government to decide whether to consider proposing a new law.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
