New York Governor Kathy Hochul and the state legislature announced this Wednesday that they had reached an agreement that will add this state to the list of 12 jurisdictions in the United States where assisted dying is allowed.
Hochul announced this Wednesday that he will turn the controversial bill into law, presented by Assemblywoman Amy Paulin and Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal, and approved last April and June, respectively.
The new law will go into effect six months after it is signed by Hochul to allow the Department of Health to implement the regulations required to put it into effect. It will also ensure that healthcare facilities can adequately prepare and train staff to comply.
With this action, the proposal ends a long journey that began its journey in the state Senate and Assembly in 2016, gradually gaining supporters, including the support of 72% of New Yorkers, according to a 2024 survey commissioned by ‘Death with Dignity’.
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Hochul, a Catholic, made the announcement this Wednesday of signing the project, along with a group supporting the proposal, in what she admits that “it was a difficult decision.”
“There is a lot of religious conflict in me. We have always talked about these issues, but I have also realized that it is not about me, but about 20 million New Yorkers,” the Democrat said in an open letter that she published today.
Hochul said he heard from “New Yorkers who are going through times of pain and suffering and from their children who are watching their parents suffer a slow, devastating decline.”
In this context, Hochul has considered that the law allows people with terminal illnesses and a prognosis of less than six months to live “to receive medical assistance to accelerate the inevitable.”
Hochul remembered in his letter his mother, whom he saw die of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, and said that he “understands” and “respects” those who oppose assisted dying.
“There are people of various faiths who believe that deliberately shortening life violates its sanctity. I understand and respect those opinions,” he said.
“After careful deliberation, I decided to support legalizing medical aid in dying under very specific circumstances and with significant protections built into the law to ensure it is not misused or widely applied,” he explained.
The new project indicates, after the agreement with the legislature, that there will be a mandatory waiting period of 5 days between the issuance of a prescription and its dispatch. The patient’s oral request for medical assistance in dying must be video or audio recorded.
It will also limit the availability of medical aid in dying to New York residents and require that a patient’s initial evaluation by a doctor be in person.
It will allow religiously oriented home palliative care providers the option of assisting a patient in dying and ensure that violation of the law is defined as professional misconduct.
Senator Hoylman-Sigal said that today New York has made history and that it is “a monumental victory for every New Yorker who has desired to peacefully end the suffering of a terminal illness.”
In 1994 Oregon became the first state to legalize physician-assisted suicide through a referendum vote.
With information from EFE
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