A new article for Katie Couric Media, attempts to make the case for expanding assisted suicide across the country, pointing to the recent implementation of assisted suicide in New York and arguing that such laws give terminally ill patients greater autonomy and control.

But the article quickly dismisses some of the most serious concerns raised by disability-rights advocates. It calls fears of coercion and abuse simply “wrong” and argues that existing safeguards adequately protect vulnerable patients. Although it ignores the many cases of abuse and coercion, it also ignores the fundamental inequality created when people with certain illnesses or disabilities can receive help ending their lives while other suicidal patients are offered prevention, treatment, and support.

The article also insists that assisted suicide does not result in more deaths, but merely “fewer people suffering.” That framing leaves little room for the concerns of people with disabilities who warn that autonomy does not exist in a vacuum. Decisions about death can be shaped by inadequate healthcare, lack of support, financial pressures, and a culture that too often treats disability and dependence as burdens.

When the law offers suicide prevention to some people but assisted suicide to others based on illness or disability, that is not equal treatment. Every patient deserves protection, care, and support, not a pathway to death.