As of Friday, it is again legal in California for doctors to help their terminally ill patients to die.
The controversial 2015 legalization of medical aid in dying was in effect for almost two years before it was ruled unconstitutional on May 25 by Riverside County Superior Court Judge Daniel A. Ottolia. Friday’s reinstatement of the law, while the appeals process plays out, is another twist in the increasingly dramatic fight that goes to the core of what Californians want when it comes to choices at the end of life.
The End of Life Option Act went into effect two years ago on the heels of an emotional campaign highlighting the life and death of Brittany Maynard, a young woman dying of brain cancer.
Suddenly it was legal for doctors to provide life-ending medications to certain terminally ill patients who requested them. This new option initially struck many of us physicians as anathema to our professional ethic.
Read more at the San Francisco Chronicle…