After some political tussles, the Canadian Parliament has legalised assisted dying.

The Parliament of Canada has legalised assisted dying. (Photo: Jeffery Nichols)

 

The historic law was passed this Friday and allows a dying patient to opt for assisted dying within specific limitations:

Keywords: Canada | Legislation | Legislative reform

 

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Well it's on again. The not-so-secret double dissolution trigger has been pulled, and Australians are off to the polls.

Again this election, Vote Compass is running a service that allows you to explore how your views align with various parties and candidates.

One of the key questions in the Vote Compass repertoir is to agree or disagree with the statement "Terminally ill patients should be able to legally end their own lives with medical assistance."

Keywords: Australia | Legislative reform

 

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On Friday September 11th 2015, the California legislature passed an assisted dying bill, the End Of Life Option Act, modelled on the Oregon Death With Dignity Act which has been in effect since 1997. It had been a long and tortuous wait to see if Governor Jerry Brown would sign the Bill into law.

It is reported that Governor Brown struggled to decide whether to sign the Bill which was actively opposed by the Catholic Church. Governor Brown is a former Jesuit seminary student. He sought views from his doctors, from a Catholic Bishop, from disability advocates, retired South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu and others, to reach a decision.

Keywords: Physician-assisted dying (PAD) | USA | California | Catholic Church | Catholic | Legislative reform

 

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The Royal Australian College of Physicians (RACP) invited reasoned and measured assisted-dying doctor, Dr Rodney Syme, to address its annual conference in Cairns, and then unceremoniously pulled the plug. Cowardice? Flip-flop? You bet.

In February this year, Dr Syme says he was approached by a member of the the RACP 2015 Congress committe to attend and deliver a paper to the annual conference, in Cairns 24-27 May. The title of his paper was "Caring for those at the end of their journey." Dr Syme accepted the invitation and spent considerable time and effort preparing and polishing his paper.

Keywords: Flip-flop | Australia | Legislative reform

 

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The launch of DyingForChoice.com, a service dedicated to reasoned argument in supported of assisted dying law reform, and underpinned by sound evidence, has been announced.

Keywords: Physician-assisted dying (PAD) | Voluntary euthanasia (VE) | Assisted dying (AD) | Legislative reform | Lobbying: Supporters

 

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