Overview

• Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins said the Medical Aid in Dying Act is likely to reach the floor within the next week as session ends June 12.
• The act would permit mentally competent adults with terminal prognoses of six months or less to self-administer physician-prescribed, life-ending medication.
• Opponents have criticized the bill’s definitions of capacity, lack of mandatory counseling, and witness requirements and warned of pressure on vulnerable patients.
• Advocates and patients, including sponsor Amy Paulin and Dr. Jeremy Boal, argue that it provides autonomy and reassurance for terminally ill individuals even if they do not use the medication.
• A similar physician-assisted suicide measure in Illinois has cleared the House but stalled in the Senate, with ethicists citing Canada’s surge in assisted deaths as a cautionary example.