SACRAMENTO — A bill to allow terminally ill Californians to end their lives with lethal prescriptions cleared its first legislative hurdle Tuesday, amid controversy over privacy issues and potential abuse.
The 5-4 vote in the Assembly Judiciary Committee puts California a step closer to becoming the second state in the nation, after Oregon, to allow doctor-assisted suicide
Much testimony in the hearing centered on Oregon's seven years of experience with helping the terminally ill kill themselves. Voters there passed the "Death With Dignity" act as an initiative in 1994 and reaffirmed it in 1997.
Witnesses included former Oregon Gov. Barbara Roberts, who served from 1991 to 1995. Her husband, a state senator who died of lung cancer, several times introduced doctor-assisted suicide bills that failed in the Oregon Legislature.
Roberts told California legislators that the law had been used sparingly and led to improvements in Oregon's end-of-life care. From 1998 to 2004, according to annual reports by the Oregon Department of Human Services, 326 prescriptions for lethal doses were written, leading to 208 deaths. Ninety percent of those using the law were receiving hospice care tailored to ease their deaths.
"Oregon voters became the best-informed Americans in any of our 50 states on the subjects of dying, pain medication, heroic medical procedures, advanced directives and hospice care," said Roberts of the debate over the initiative. "Dying was discussed over dinner and in bowling alleys, in hair salons and barbershops, gyms and classrooms and churches."
Kenneth R. Stevens, Jr., a professor in the radiation oncology department at Oregon Health Sciences University, and an opponent of the Oregon law, questioned its safeguards. He said only 5% of those dying from doctor-assisted suicide in 2003 and 2004 had received mental health consultations.
Stevens also reminded California lawmakers of an Oregon man who awoke 65 hours after taking the supposedly lethal prescription in February.
"The fact that the word 'safeguards' is used is an indication that assisted suicide is dangerous and unsafe for the general public," he said.
The hearing drew dozens of doctors, nurses, religious leaders and people who had struggled with a loved one's death. Although each was were asked to give lawmakers only his or her name, affiliation and position on the bill, some interjected brief personal stories and statements.
