By Bill Miller and Currents News
ALBANY — The Medical Aid in Dying Act, which would allow terminally ill patients to end their lives with doctor-prescribed drugs, has new life, having passed the New York State Assembly with an 81-67 vote on April 29.
As of May 1, the bill, also called the MAID Act, was in the New York State Senate’s Health Committee. Meanwhile, Gov. Kathy Hochul has not publicly taken a position on the bill. She is an ardent supporter of abortion rights, while also pursuing suicide-prevention programs.
Opposition to the bill continues from New York’s episcopal leaders, including Bishop Robert Brennan, who on April 30 stated his disappointment that the MAID Act cleared the State Assembly. Each legislative session for the past decade has opened with the reintroduction of the act, which Bishop Brennan noted had never made it to a vote in either chamber until now.
“But you have to win every year,” Bishop Brennan said. “And at some point, it’s going to get the traction. And sure enough, in rapid fire, it passed.”
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Bishop Brennan added he has heard the vote could be tight in the Senate.
“I don’t think it’s all that encouraging,” he said. “But I think we just have to try. People can be persuaded. I’ll be trying to reach out to the Senate, just like we’re asking everybody else to do.”
The bill, if approved, would allow terminally ill patients to end their lives with doctor-prescribed medications, but with conditions.
For example, patients will have to:
- Be diagnosed with a terminal illness with less than six months to live, according to a physician.
- Be mentally competent and able to make their own healthcare decisions.
- Be confirmed by two physicians as having a terminal illness, plus the mental competency to make decisions.
- Administer the drugs by themselves.
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Amy Paulin, a Democrat from Scarsdale, is the bill’s primary sponsor in the Assembly. A Brooklyn native, Paulin represents Assembly District 88, which covers a wide portion of Westchester County. She thanked supporters during a press conference shortly after the winning vote.
“When this bill first was presented to me I thought it was odd, a concept that they would only do in a place like Oregon,” Paulin said. “But my staff at the time convinced me that it was the right thing to do. It didn’t take that long for me to feel that in my gut.”
Paulin explained that her sister was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in March of 2012. It went into remission but returned three years later, inflicting grave pain. She recalled that her sister shouted out repeatedly, demanding to know when death would end her suffering.
“The lasting memory I have of my sister is shouting in pain,” Paulin said. “So today, with this bill passing, I pass it in her memory.”
Still, the Catechism of the Catholic Church states that “an act or omission which, of itself or by intention, causes death in order to eliminate suffering constitutes a murder gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person.”
“This bill is a little bit of a misnomer in that it’s called ‘death with dignity,’ ” Bishop Brennan said. “It’s not dignity.”
The bishops, therefore, refer to points made by the New York State Catholic Conference. For example, the conference asserts:
- The American Medical Association has stated that “physician-assisted suicide is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer.”
- “The prescribing doctor doesn’t even have to be the patient’s regular provider. The national group Death with Dignity tells patients they could ‘ask any doctor … even your dermatologist’ to write a suicide prescription.”
- MAID “runs smack into Gov. Hochul’s very successful suicide prevention efforts” for schools, pediatrician practices, hospitals, veterans, and first responder initiatives.
- Bishop Brennan said he and his fellow prelates are concerned that legalizing MAID tells young people that life is disposable and it’s OK to consider suicide if there seems to be no hope.
“We’re dealing with the suicide crisis in this country, and certainly here in this state,” Bishop Brennan said. “One needs to ask, ‘What mixed messages am I sending?’ “
