US can't bar euthanasia

2006-01-17 21:33

Washington - In a blow to President George W Bush's administration, the United States supreme court ruled on Tuesday to uphold assisted suicide in the northwestern state of Oregon.

The six-to-three ruling rejected the government's stance that it could bar doctors in the only state to allow physician-aided suicide from prescribing medication meant to euthanise.

Federal laws on the matter do not authorise the US attorney-general "to bar dispensing controlled substances for assisted suicide in the face of a state medical regime permitting such conduct", said the ruling.

Voting in the minority for the government view was the court's newest member, John Roberts, who was appointed chief justice by Bush last September.

The attorney-general, backed by religious groups, had petitioned the court to endorse a federal government move to prevent doctors from prescribing life-ending medicine to patients who asked for it, a practice that was legal under Oregon state law.

The decision was cheered by euthanasia advocates.

"This is really a tremendous ruling on the part of the supreme court upholding the rights of terminally ill patients to control their end-of-life care," said Robert Kenneth, director of communications for Death With Dignity.

Oregon instituted the nation's only law allowing physician-assisted suicide in 1997, backed by two statewide votes in favour of it.

Between 1997 and 2004, the latest year for which data is available, 208 people killed themselves under the "Death with Dignity" law.

The law strictly regulates the practice, requiring that the patient wishing to die has an incurable or irreversible condition that would result in death within six months.

The law also requires that two doctors evaluate the patient, to be sure he qualifies and is cognisant of the decision to die and fully willing before the prescription can be approved.

- AFP