Aid in dying bill clears hurdle in state Assembly


Sen. Diane Savino is the Senate sponsor of the bill that would allow doctors to prescribe life-ending medicine to terminally ill patients if they request it. (Staten Island Advance/Rachel Shapiro)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. - A controversial bill to legalize so-called physician-assisted suicide in New York has cleared a hurdle, being voted through the Assembly Health Committee.

Sen. Diane Savino is the Senate sponsor of the bill, the Medical Aid in Dying Act, which would give doctors in the state the ability to prescribe end-of-life drugs to terminally ill patients who request it.

The act is the result of combining Savino's initial bill, End of Life Options Act, sponsored by Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal in that chamber, with the Patient Self-Determination Act, sponsored by Assemblywoman Amy Paulin and Sen. John Bonacic.

The Medical Aid in Dying Act would allow life-ending drugs in cases where two doctors diagnose a patient as mentally sound and terminally ill and two witnesses confirm the patient's request for the drugs is voluntary.

The Senate bill is in the Health Committee, awaiting approval.


Proponents of the act object to calling taking the end-of-life pills suicide.

"Aid in dying is not suicide, that's in the bill," said David Leven, executive director of End of Life Choices New York, a group that advocates for the law's passage. "Suicide is tragic. This is an act of empowerment. It's not as if these people want to die. They are dying and it's a matter of how they die."

Five states -- Oregon, Washington, Montana, Vermont and California (starting June 9) -- have similar laws on the books.

Proponents favor offering the pills as an end-of-life option, wherein the patient takes them and dies gently in his or her sleep when the suffering becomes too painful.

The bill makes it a felony to attempt to coerce or exploit any patient into taking the drug.

It also protects healthcare providers from liability if they act within the law.

If the attending and consulting doctors feel a psychiatric evaluation is needed, a mental health professional enters the picture.

Leven noted that the medical community is divided on the merits of the law -- the American Medical Association opposes it and argues that hospice care provides adequate pain management for these patients.

The American Medical Student Association and American Medical Women's Association are proponents.

Oregon's law has been in effect for 18 years, and supporters of the New York proposal point to that Pacific Northwest state's success.

"The law has worked virtually as intended," Leven said.

Very few people in that state request the life-ending pills and even fewer actually take the pills.

"Thousands of people are comforted just knowing they have this option available to them," Leven argued.

Eric Seiff is one of them.

An 83-year-old attorney and competitive runner from the Bronx, Seiff was diagnosed with bladder cancer at the end of 2013.

He went through chemotherapy, and in June 2014 had his bladder removed. At the end of 2014, the cancer appeared in his lung. He received experimental treatment that built up his immune system to allow his body to attack the cancer and it worked -- the tumor receded and for the last year, he has been cancer-free.

At no time during the process did he want to end his life.

"But I'm a realist and I know one way or another something's going to happen to me," he said.

"If I'm at that point where there's no hope and I'm in considerable pain or other comparable disability, I want to have the ability to say 'enough'."

Savino understands Seiff's perspective.

"You should have an option to decide: do you want to let nature take its course or do you want to have control over it?" she said. "Some people feel, 'I want to decide when I end this'."


The Catholic Conference calls aid in dying suicide and opposes it on moral grounds.

JJ Hanson with Patients Rights Action Fund argues the premise of the movement to legalize aid in dying drugs is flawed.

The Sullivan County resident was diagnosed in May 2014 with a rare form of brain cancer -- the same that Californian Brittany Maynard had. She moved to Oregon to get the life-ending pills and set off a national discussion.

Like Maynard, Hanson was given a terminal diagnosis with four months left to live. He received chemotherapy, radiation and surgery to remove the cancer.

During the treatment, he had nine seizures and lost cognitive abilities.

Now, two years later, the cancer is gone.

"Doctors are not always correct ... so this creates a pretty dangerous scenario for patients," he said. "You can survive."

With physician-assisted suicide, as the act's opponents see it, "Hope is being take away from people who could otherwise be fighting against the disease."

He challenged the narrative that assisted suicide is the dignified way to die, preventing terminally ill patients from dying a painful death.

He argued that many terminally ill patients who would take the end-of-life pills would do so because they feel they are a burden to their families and caregivers, not because they are in unmanageable pain.

That is coercion, he said, something that other opponents fear will become the norm if the bill is passed.

Diane Coleman, president and CEO of Rochester-based Not Dead Yet, focuses on the rights of disabled and elderly people, who she fears may be coerced into ending their lives, either to prevent a burden, or at the prompting of an heir.

The bill doesn't prevent an heir or caregiver from suggesting the drug to the patient. While two witnesses must sign off on the patient's request for the drug, confirming that it's voluntary, the taking of the drug itself, usually done at home, is not supervised.

If a patient changes his or her mind -- as Leven said in Oregon, one-third who get the pills don't take them -- there's nothing to prevent someone from giving the patient the drug, Coleman argued.

"A relative may have become tired of waiting," she said.

Savino dismissed Hanson's and Coleman's arguments.

The end-of-life pills are only given then -- at the end of a person's life -- not as an alternative to life-saving care.

"This is not a replacement for hospice or palliative care," Savino explained. The pills -- 100 in all -- are for when doctors have exhausted all life-saving options and the goal is to keep the patient comfortable.

For the many patients who are given the drugs and then opt not to take them, Savino doesn't buy the argument that the pills could be given to the patient against his or her will.

"It's pretty hard to get 100 pills down someone's throat if they don't want to take them," she said. "If your family member wants to kill you, they're going to find other ways to kill you, they don't need this, let's be honest."

As for the argument that disabled or elderly patients could be coerced into taking the drugs, Savino noted that disabled people are not eligible for the drug -- one must be cognizant enough to make his or her own decision.

The senator also pointed out that, "Ultimately, we're already doing something like this, whether people want to acknowledge it or not" because doctors can suspend end-of-life intervention like having a feeding tube, water or other life support mechanisms.

"There's really very little difference in what we're proposing other than the method," she said.