A revision to Washington state’s Death with Dignity Act stalls in the Senate
A bill aimed at making it easier for terminally ill, competent patients to use Washington state’s Death with Dignity Act has stalled in the state Legislature.
The existing law allows competent adults with six months or less to live to request lethal doses of medication from a physician. Once a patient has the medication, they can decide to take it to end their life. Voters in 30 of 39 counties approved the law in 2008.
Some who have seen it operate say the law currently includes unnecessary barriers. Rep. Skyler Rude, R-Walla Walla, introduced a bill this year aimed to address those concerns, framing the issue at times as one of individual liberty.
After passing out of the House on a 60-37 vote and through the Health & Long Term Care Committee in the Senate, House Bill 1141 was not considered by the full chamber ahead of the recent deadline for bills. This legislative session, slated to end April 25, is the first in a two-year cycle, so the bill isn’t fully “dead” — it will start back in the House next year.
As McClatchy previously reported, the bill would make a series of changes to the Death with Dignity Act, such as shortening the waiting period between a first and second oral request to a physician from 15 days to 72 hours, or less if person making the request not expected to survive 72 hours.
The bill, Rude said came as a result of working with a group of physicians who’ve used the law with patients. The waiting period was a key concern.
Among other changes, it would also allow the medication to be delivered by mail, which Rude has said addresses an issue in eastern Washington. It also would allow for one of the two providers who sign off on a patient’s requests to be a physician assistant or advanced registered nurse practitioner, replacing a requirement that both providers be physicians.
Opposition to the bill came from a few angles. Critics who testified against the bill included representatives with the Archdiocese of Seattle and Washington State Catholic Conference. The Washington State Medical Association also opposed it, taking issue with specific changes — although the organization is also opposed to the underlying law.
Opponents of the existing law ultimately do not want to make it more accessible, Rude said — a proposed striking amendment would’ve created a work group to look at the law and its safeguards rather than make any immediate changes.
At least one senator shared concerns brought up in committee by people representing those with developmental disabilities, Rude said. He’s had conversations with Disability Rights Washington, he said, and there doesn’t seem to be common ground in improvements that could be made to the bill. The organization has advocated for data collection and a more comprehensive work group to look at the issue.
Asked about a recent op-ed penned by retired physician Sharon Quick that ran in The News Tribune, Rude said they also talked and it was unproductive.
Quick is the Washington state director for an organization called the American Academy of Medical Ethics. On its website, the organization describes itself as subscribing to the “traditional values of the Hippocratic Oath.” Along with a position against physician-assisted suicide, it features positions against abortion, the legalization and use of recreational marijuana, embryonic stem cell research, and medical assistance with gender transition.
Quick opposed the original Act years ago and thinks the proposed changes head in the wrong direction. “This is not in patients’ best interest,” she said.
At a high level, she thinks the measure misunderstands the physiology of dying and capabilities of palliative care to address pain. Mental illness and other issues contributing to a person’s desire to hasten death, she argues, can’t be evaluated adequately in such a short time — she believes people most harmed would be those with mental illness and disabilities.
Between now and next session, Rude said he sees it as his responsibility to more diligently focus on one-on-one conversations with senators, to inform them about what the bill does and doesn’t do.
In committee, he pointed out that healthcare workers and hospitals still wouldn’t be required to participate, patients would still self-administer the medication, and the competency requirement would remain in place. Depression, for example, would still disqualify a patient from using the law.
“I think the changes in the bill are fairly modest, in my opinion, and maintain the important safeguards that were built into the law, but it certainly addresses some of the most significant barriers that we’ve been able to identify,” he said in committee.
This story was originally published April 14, 2021 at 5:45 AM with the headline "A revision to Washington state’s Death with Dignity Act stalls in the Senate."
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