COLUMBUS, Ohio (LifeSiteNews) — Democrats in Ohio have introduced a bill to legalize assisted suicide for “terminally ill” Ohioans.
Rep. Eric Synenberg is spearheading the introduction of the so-called “Ohio Medical Aid in Dying (MAID)” Act along with three other Democratic legislators, about eight years after a similar effort in 2018 fizzled out. If passed into law, Ohio residents with a prognosis of less than six months to live would be allowed to request a prescription for lethal pills.
Two doctors would have to sign off on both oral and written requests for the prescription to be filled, according to Ohio End of Life Options. The doctors must affirm that the patients are expected to have less than six months to live.
At the Ohio Statehouse, Synenberg was joined by “Ohio End of Life Options” activists for a news conference.
Ohio’s Republican-dominated legislature is considered to be unlikely to pass the bill, according to the Statehouse News Bureau. The faith-based groups Center for Christian Virtue (CCV) and Ohio Right to Life oppose the bill.
“Doctors should be in the business of healing, not killing. Ohio must remain a state that treasures every heartbeat,” CCV wrote pm Thursday. “CCV is committed to blocking any legislative effort to allow Ohio to become a (pro-euthanasia) state.”
Thirteen states and Washington, D.C., have thus far legalized assisted suicide, with legalization measures pending in about a dozen other states.
The Catholic Church teaches that suicide of any kind, whether done with the help of a medical professional or on one’s own, is a grave sin, since God is the author of life.
Evidence suggests that doctors’ estimations of life expectancy for “terminally ill” patients are “frequently inaccurate.” In one review of patients with terminal cancer, doctors underestimated survival for 23 percent of patients. In another study of terminally ill cancer patients, it was not uncommon for patients to live double their estimated survival time, and about 10 percent “lived for three or more times their estimated survival time.”