Pushback against physician-assisted suicide grows, seen as ‘winnable’ issue

Despite the onslaught of legislative efforts to legalize physician-assisted suicide in many U.S. states, defenders of the disabled and others who oppose the devaluation of vulnerable lives are expressing optimism about the tide beginning to turn in their favor on the issue.

“If we hold back two more states that are still left in play, Massachusetts and Delaware, there will be three years in a row with no new legal states [permitting physician-assisted suicide],” Matt Vallière, executive director of the Patients’ Rights Action Fund, told CNA following a panel on the subject at the 2024 summer conference of the Napa Institute.

Vallière pointed to a number of reasons the tide is turning on the issue, including the growing number of “horror stories” coming out of Canada, where legal assisted suicide, dressed up by the euphemism “medical assistance in dying” (MAID), is rampant.

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